Confused by the words 鈥淢e Too鈥� on your social media feeds today? The two simple words are part of a worldwide trend to raise awareness about the scope of the problem of sexual harassment and assault.

Women who have been harassed or assaulted are tweeting the two words to try to show how widespread such abuse really is.

Actor Alyssa Milano launched the trend Sunday afternoon, that a friend had suggested that women who had been assaulted or harassed write the words as their status, to highlight the "magnitude of the problem."

Milano鈥檚 call came as the scope of allegations against Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein has been coming to light.

More than 40 women have come forward in the last two weeks, to say they were harassed or assaulted by the now-fired studio exec, with many of the women claiming they stayed quiet because they didn鈥檛 expect anyone to believe them.

One of the first to come forward was , who starred in the TV series 鈥淐harmed鈥� with Milano.

Within hours of Milano鈥檚 tweet, more than 34,000 women -- and several men -- had replied to the tweet. The hashtag #MeToo had become a worldwide top trend on Twitter, with thousands of others posting the same message on Facebook and Instagram as well.

Actors Anna Paquin, Debra Messing and Laura Dreyfuss were among the first high-profile actors to reply with a 鈥淢e Too鈥� of their own.

Actor Javier Muñoz, best known for his role in the Broadway musical 鈥淗amilton鈥�, wrote: 鈥淢e too. I don鈥檛 know if means anything coming from a gay man but it鈥檚 happened. Multiple times.鈥�