Actress Pelted With Insults After Candid Comment About Men and Women

Actress Kirsten Dunst is taking heat over comments she made in a new interview with Harper's Bazaar UK about gender roles and romantic relationships, in which she said, "you need a man to be a man and a woman to be a woman."

"I feel like the feminine has been a little undervalued," Dunst told the magazine. "We all have to get our own jobs and make our own money, but staying at home, nurturing, being the mother, cooking -- it’s a valuable thing my mum created."

The 31-year-old actress continued: "And sometimes, you need your knight in shining armour. I’m sorry. You need a man to be a man and a woman to be a woman. That’s why relationships work."

Kirsten Dunst arrives at the 24th Annual GLAAD Media Awards at the JW Marriott on Saturday, April 20, 2013 in Los Angeles. (Jordan Strauss/Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP)

Dunst's comments touched off flurry of responses, including from Jezebel writer Erin Gloria Ryan, who called her "kind of dumb."

"I'm not going to couch this much because Kirsten Dunst is not paid to write gender theory so it shouldn't surprise anyone that she's kind of dumb about it, just as I wouldn't be surprised if Gloria Steinem sucked at convincingly and heartbreakingly playing a mysterious oversexed teen who kills herself in a Sofia Coppola movie," Ryan wrote.

And Stacey Ritzen over at Uproxx called Dunst an "insufferable person," titling her write-up, "Kirsten Dunst Thinks That Women Should Know Their Place Is In The Home."

But others have come forward to defend Dunst, agreeing with her take on the roles of men and women in relationships.

Commentator Greg Gutfeld, for instance, lambasted negative responses to the actress' claims, quipping that even "oxygen angers" some feminists.

"See, to them it's dumb not to see relationships through the prism of anger, that love is really about power and ideology that forbids traditional old-fashioned gender roles," he wrote. "So why not marry yourself instead? You never need to get out of sweatpants."

Others struck a similar tone, including TheBlaze's own Dana Loesch and actor Adam Baldwin, who defended Dunst on Twitter and told her critics to back off.

Here are just some of the tweets that have been circulating in recent days:

[blackbirdpie url="https://twitter.com/AdamBaldwin/statuses/455912471333572609"]

[blackbirdpie url="https://twitter.com/DLoesch/statuses/455885869497339904"]

[blackbirdpie url="https://twitter.com/anniebeans59/status/456101840716038144"]

[blackbirdpie url="https://twitter.com/MyConservative/status/454401093556903936"]

[blackbirdpie url="https://twitter.com/GibsonDonalgbsn/statuses/455920504977645569"]

[blackbirdpie url="https://twitter.com/MarcHilliker/status/455888593483866113"]

[blackbirdpie url="https://twitter.com/ChrisLoesch/statuses/455890415359492096"]

[blackbirdpie url="https://twitter.com/SMichelMusic/status/456064817661739008"]

[blackbirdpie url="https://twitter.com/ConservRachel/status/456093155604320257"]

[blackbirdpie url="https://twitter.com/SusannaMartinvs/status/456063192624807936"]

[blackbirdpie url="https://twitter.com/AdamBaldwin/statuses/455906216040886272"]

[blackbirdpie url="https://twitter.com/Jimi971/statuses/455898599386124288"]

Dunst hasn't publicly weighed in on the reaction.

(H/T: Twitchy)