In her documentary, Janet recalled speaking with Justin “once” just after the Super Bowl incident. “He said, ‘I don’t know if I should come out and make a statement.’ I said, ‘Listen, I don’t want any drama for you. They’re aiming all of this at me. If I were you, I wouldn’t say anything.'”
Janet has rarely spoken publicly about the scandal. In 2006, when asked by Oprah Winfrey if she felt Justin failed to adequately stick up for her, she replied, “To a certain degree, yeah.” She also told her that she regretted issuing an apology because, “it was an accident. And management I had at the time, they thought it was important that I did it…And I had said to them, ‘Why am I apologizing for an accident?'”
In her documentary, Janet also recalled how she and her family were affected by the Super Bowl incident. She said that people would come up to a few of her brothers and tell them that they wished she would “be put away.”
“It can take its toll on you, emotionally. So I just stayed focused on my work, stayed close to friends, stayed in touch with family,” she added. “And that was enough for me to pull through.”
She made similar comments in a recent February 2022 cover interview for Allure magazine, saying, “What’s really important is going back to having that foundation. Not just family, but God. That’s what really pulled me through.”
