FKA Twigs has recently come out to accuse ex boyfriend Shia Labeouf of physically assaulting her, sexual battery and infliction of emotional distress in a legal action she filed in LA Superior Court last December, and he has denied abuse claims.
Still, as traumatic a time as this must be for her she agreed to do an interview with Gayle King to discuss numerous things, including the accusations.
That’s when King, reporting for CBS Morning, asked a question too far. “Nobody who’s been in this position likes this question, and I often wonder if it’s even appropriate to ask … why didn’t you leave?”
To which FKA answered, “I think we have to stop asking that question.”
She told the host, ‘I know that you’re asking it out of love, but like, I’m just going to make a stance and say I’m not going to answer that question anymore because the question should really be to the abuser, “Why are you holding someone hostage with abuse?”
“People say, “Oh, it can’t have been that bad, because she would’ve left.” And it’s like no, because it was that bad, I couldn’t leave.”
She continues, “Abusers use gaslighting, which is where somebody minimizes your experience and alters your narrative and wont listen to you and denying your experience. Eventually it did become physical. There were certain instances where he would push me and say “you fell”. And I would get really confused and think maybe I did.’
Reliving everything as she spoke, Twigs broke down in tears admitting Shia could have killed them both when he threatened to crash the car around Valentine’s Day 2019 during a ‘disturbing’ trip to a spa in Palm Springs.
She stated he was “speeding down the road and saying that if I said I didn’t love him and if I was going to leave him, he would smash the car to the side of a wall. ‘I thought “Wow, he needs so much control over me that he would kill us both.”
‘And eventually, he pulled over to a gas station and I tried to unload my bags from the car and there were three men opposite the car and I remember thinking “This is it, I’m done, I can’t do this anymore.”‘
That’s when, she says, he picked her up by the neck. the other people at the gas station said and did nothing. “They just watched us and I felt so alone. That’s why I wanted to come forward. Victims and survivors shouldn’t have to feel alone.”
Just absolutely horrible. I hope she gets the help she needs to rebound, but it sounds like she’s already empowering herself and that has to do a great deal for building your inner strength.