Ben Affleck Reveals Connection To Britney Spears - And THIS ‘Cruelty’ Of Fame

Ben Affleck has deep “empathy” for Britney Spears.

The Gone Girl star appeared on a recent episode of Theo Von’s This Past Weekend podcast where he opens up about the “collective cruelty” celebs face — and how he feels for what he’s seen the Toxic singer go through. The 52-year-old explains:

“A long time ago, years and years ago, I really had a lot of empathy for Britney Spears.”

He clarifies she’s “not somebody that I knew or hung out with,” but “like everybody else, he saw “all this s**t that comes through.” The Air star continues:

“Having had my own experience with myself, these people are following her around in a time where she may or may not have been having difficulty. I don’t know because I don’t know her, but I do know that the cycle of having people harangue you and yell at you and hassle you and follow you. It seemed like that itself was kind of whipping up the whole thing into a tizzy.”

Britney was subjected to mass scrutiny in 2008 surrounding her mental health. But that scrutiny itself, which included constant hounding by paparazzi, in turn only made things so much worse. And that year she was placed in her infamous conservatorship.

Ben describes the focus on her as being something we as a society perpetrated against her, even if most didn’t intend to do any harm:

“That’s the first time I thought this is kind of a weird, unintentional — I think culturally — but kind of collective cruelty where what’s taken out of the image that you see are the people around waving the stick at the tiger or poking on it.”

Referring to the rise paparazzi and fans often provoke from celebs, he notes:

“All you see is the growling animal, but a part of that is because somebody is coming around and hitting it to make it get active.”

You can hear him talk about it more (below):

Hearing Ben talk about Britney is NOT exactly something we ever expected! But it makes sense how empathetic he is towards her situation considering how averse he is to being in the spotlight. But funny enough, while he made it VERY clear in the conversation he doesn’t know the Circus singer, she claimed last February she once made out with him “years ago.” Hmm…

What are your thoughts, Perezcious readers? Do you agree with what Ben had to say? Let us know in the comments down below.

[Images via Theo Von/YouTube & Adriana M. Barraza/WENN]