The actor tied the knot with Jodie Turner-Smith in 2019.
Joshua Jackson is speaking out against social media trolls. In an interview with Refinery29, the 43-year-old actor calls out people who left negative comments on his wife, Jodie Turner-Smith's, Instagram account after learning that she was the one who proposed to him.
"I accidentally threw my wife under the bus because that story was told quickly and it didn't give the full context and holy Jesus, the internet is racist and misogynist," Jackson says of when he revealed Turner-Smith's proposal to him during an appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon last month.
During the late-night appearance, Jackson said of the proposal, "She asked me on New Year's Eve. We were in Nicaragua. It was very beautiful, incredibly romantic, we were walking down the beach and she asked me to marry her. I did not know [she would propose], but she was quite adamant and she was right. This is the best choice I ever made."
While speaking to Refinery29, Jackson expands on the tale of his proposal, and shares that he later proposed to the 34-year-old actress, too.
"We were in Nicaragua on a beautiful moonlit night, it could not possibly have been more romantic," he recalls. "And yes, my wife did propose to me and yes, I did say yes, but what I didn't say in that interview was there was a caveat, which is that I'm still old school enough that I said, 'This is a yes, but you have to give me the opportunity [to do it too].'"
"She has a biological father and a stepdad, who's the man who raised her. [I said], 'You have to give me the opportunity to ask both of those men for your hand in marriage.' And then, 'I would like the opportunity to re-propose those to you and do it the old fashioned way down on bended knee,'" he continued. "So, that's actually how the story ended up."
Though he did eventually pop the question to his wife, Jackson is quick to criticize anyone who has a problem with Turner-Smith's proposal to him.
"For anybody who is freaked out by a woman claiming her own space, shut the f**k up," he says. "Good God, you cannot believe the things people were leaving my wife on Instagram. She did it. I said 'yes.' We're happy. That's it. That's all you need to know."
Being married to a Black woman, Jackson notes, "has been a real education for me as a white man, truly."
"The way people get in her comments and the ignorance and ugliness that comes her way is truly shocking," he says." And it has been a necessary, but an unpleasant education in just the way people relate to Black bodies in general, but Black female bodies in specific. It is not OK. We have a long way to go."
While Jackson is proud of how Turner-Smith handles the negativity, he says, "I would wish for my wife that she would not have to rise above with such amazing strength and grace, above the ugliness that people throw at her on a day to day."
"I am impressed with her that she does it, but I would wish that that would not be the armor that she has to put on every morning to just navigate being alive," Jackson adds.
While the internet can certainly be a breeding ground for negativity, the couple, who tied the knot in 2019, often use social media to flirt with each other, with Jackson remarking, "I am happy that my wife is thirsty for me."
"We're rarely in the same room [writing] the thirsty comments because that usually just gets said to each other," he says. "But, look, if either of us misses a comment, you better believe at night, there's a, 'Hey, did you see what I wrote?' One, she's very easy to love out loud and two, she's phenomenal."
After saying "I do," the pair welcomed their daughter, Janie, in April 2020.
"The love and support that is coming my direction has been a revelation in my life," Jackson says of his wife and daughter. "I've said this often, and it just is the truth: If you ever needed to test whether or not you had chosen the right partner in life, just have a baby at the beginning of a pandemic and then spend a year and a half together. And then you know. And then you absolutely know."
"I didn't get married until fairly late in the game," he continues. "I didn't have a baby till very late in the game and they're the two best choices I've ever made in my life."
As for what their 1-year-old daughter is up to these days, Jackson reveals that she's "all the way into books."
"Story time is my favorite part of the day because it gives me the opportunity to have that time with her just one-on-one," he says. "Her favorite book right now is a book called Bedtime Bonnet. Every night I bring out three books, and she gets to pick one. The other two shift a little bit, but Bedtime Bonnet is every single night."
When ET spoke to the actor last month, he gushed over the life he shares with his wife and daughter.
"There is nothing that is not better off than being married to her and having that baby," he said. "It's everything."
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