Actress Mayim Bialik, well known for her modesty in the name of Judaism, showed her cleavage to TV presenter Piers Morgan on a talk show on Monday.
Ms Bialik, known for her starring roles in The Big Bang Theory and Blossom, turned her back to the audience on the Late Late Show with James Corden to pull open her dress for Mr Morgan in defense of actress Susan Sarandon and what has become known as #CleavageGate.
Mr Morgan had criticised Academy Award-winning actress Susan Sarandon,for wearing a revealing outfit when presenting an award at the Screen Actors Guild Awards on Saturday.
Would Susan Sarandon wear this to a funeral? No.
It was thus horribly inappropriate for an In Memoriam tribute. pic.twitter.com/hMoGChJY8D
This led to a backlash on social media from people describing themselves as feminists. Ms Bialik told Mr Morgan “I identify as a feminist and I’m going to do it this way.”
Ms Bialik has spoken and written publicly about both her commitment to Judaism and her choice to dress modestly in Hollywood.
Writing on her Kveller blog in 2013 she said: “As a person who spends much of my life as a public person being observed, judged, and picked apart for how I look, I have come more and more to appreciate the healthy sense of protection that tznius [Jewish modesty] provides me.”
While in an interview with Fox News last year she said: “Being a modest dresser, that for me is a certain amount of my religious faith — privacy and chastity. Just because I have a body doesn’t mean it means to be on display.”
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