Zachary Quinto Slams Kevin Spacey For Coming Out Only After Sexual Assault Allegations

Zachary Quinto is calling out Kevin Spacey for coming out as gay when it served him, after actor Anthony Rapp came forward with a sexual assault allegation against Spacey.

ZACHARY QUINTO RESPONDS TO KEVIN SPACEY COMING OUT, ANTHONY RAPP ALLEGATIONS

Star Trek: Discovery actor Rapp revealed in an interview that it was Spacey who attempted to seduce him when he was just 14-year-old, and Spacey was 26. They had worked together on Broadway and Rapp alleges that Spacey picked him up and laid him down on his bed and tried to “get with me sexually.”

In his response, Spacey did not deny the accusation, but rather said he did not remember the incident. He did say, “But if I did behave then as he describes, I owe him the sincerest apology for what would have been deeply inappropriate drunken behavior.” Spacey also took the opportunity to come out as gay in the same tweet.

Star Trek film star Quinto took issue with this, and responded to the incident with his own tweet. “It is deeply sad and troubling that this is how kevin spacey has chosen to come out,” wrote the actor, who himself came out publicly in 2011. “Not by standing up as a point of pride – in the light of all his many awards and accomplishments thus inspiring tens of thousands of struggling LGBTQ kids around the world [–] but as a calculated manipulation to deflect attention from the very serious accusation that he attempted to molest one,” he continued. “I am sorry to hear of anthony rapp’s experience and subsequent suffering. I am sorry that kevin only saw fit to acknowledge his truth when he thought it would serve him – just as his denial served him for so many years. May anthony rapp’s voice be the one amplified here. Victim’s voices are the ones that deserve to be heard.”

Other celebrities and activists have also spoken out against Spacey’s so-called apology, saying he is using his coming out as a PR smokescreen to detract from Rapp’s allegation. According to GLAAD, the focus should stay on the alleged victim.

“Coming-out stories should not be used to deflect from allegations of sexual assault,” says president and CEO of GLAAD Sarah Kate Ellis. “This is not a coming-out story about Kevin Spacey, but a story of survivorship by Anthony Rapp and all those who bravely speak out against unwanted sexual advances. The media and public should not gloss over that.”

Rapp previously recalled the sexual assault in a 2001 article, in which he did not name Spacey. Now, he says, he came forward again, “standing on the shoulders of the many courageous women and men who have been speaking out to shine a light and hopefully make a difference, as they have done for me.”