Gwyneth Paltrow knows she has a lot of haters on the Web.
Fresh off her split from husband Chris Martin, the actress told an audience at a top tech conference Tuesday evening that she is wounded by all the insults hurled her way.
It feels like “the scabs from your high school wounds being ripped off on a daily basis,” Paltrow said at the Re/code conference in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif.
Paltrow, who founded digital and e-commerce site Goop, took to the stage to talk about “objectification and dehumanization” of anonymous Internet comments.
She was slated to speak on the topic for five minutes but went on for 15 minutes about how it feels to be “a person in the culture that people want to harm.”
“The lack of empathy that is created when people can anonymously opine about the looks or actions of others … It’s where we are in our culture,” she said.
“Yes, it does worry me, for the development of my kids and the next generation, that people can be so cruel without experiencing the consequences of being so cruel face to face.”
Paltrow took plenty of heat for referring to the end of her 10-year marriage as a “conscious uncoupling.” She also came across as tone-deaf when she claimed non-celebrity moms have it easier than her in many ways.
Paltrow said she “gets it” that people throw cyber-stones at celebrities because “we’re annoying,” but she’s clearly not over it.
“When you’ve been made fun of and excoriated and dragged through the mud and lied about for 20 years in front of the world … you actually realize it’s not about you,” she said.
“Anyone in any field who has their head rise above a poppy in the field, they get their heads chopped off.”