The 48-year-old was speaking about playing Lee Miller in Lee, a biopic about the Second World War photographer’s life, and said she thought the comments were “absolutely bizarre” because her character’s body “would be soft”.
Speaking on Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg, the star said she intends to “live my life” and “enjoy it” rather than worry about her appearance.
She said: “It’s interesting how much people do like labels for women.
“And they very much liked them in Lee’s day, and, annoyingly, they sort of still do – we slap these labels on women that we just don’t have for men. It’s absolutely bizarre to me.
“It was my job to be like Lee. She wasn’t lifting weights and doing Pilates, she was eating cheese, bread and drinking wine and not making a big deal of it, so of course her body would be soft.
“But I think we’re so used to perhaps not necessarily seeing that and enjoying it – the instinct, weirdly, is to see it and criticise it or comment on it in some way.
“And people were saying ‘God, how wonderful, you know. She’s saying that she doesn’t care about her body’.
“I was talking about the character that I’m playing, but of course I don’t care.
“But it was through the conversation about playing Lee… and I think my point is that, as women, we so need to be having that conversation and just celebrating just being a real shape and being soft and maybe having a few extra rolls.
“Life is too short, do you know? I don’t want to look back and go ‘Why did I worry about that thing?’ And so, guess what? I don’t worry anymore. I don’t care.
“I’m just going to live my life, going to enjoy it, get on with it. You’ve got one go around – make the most of it.”
Kuenssberg asked Winslet if she still wants social media companies to “stand up and do something” about the impact on children and families, as she had after starring in Channel 4’s I Am Ruth, a film about a family whose lives are turned upside down by social media.
The actress replied: “I do still think ‘Stand up and do something’.
“I’m just finding it staggering that more isn’t being done. It’s an extraordinary thing as an actor – sometimes when you can just open that door to a conversation, and I was overwhelmed by how much we really did ignite debate.
“There has been this real upswell in communities and, in fact, entire towns, it turns out, in this country, where they are making them social media or even smartphone-free zones for children, under-16s.
“And that’s why we made I Am Ruth, it’s because I was realising that so many people I was coming across and hearing about their awful, sad stories. They just felt so isolated and alone and shameful, thinking ‘Oh my God, it’s just me, how has this happened to me, to my child?’
“So I do think it’s changing. I’m hoping it will change a lot more, but hopefully little by little we might get there.”
Winslet began her acting career at the age of 15 in 1991 BBC children’s TV series Dark Season, before soaring to international fame with 1997’s Titanic.
She has gone on to win an Oscar, a Grammy, two Emmy Awards, and five Baftas.
– Lee will be released in UK cinemas on Friday September 13.