RuPaul’s Drag Queen star Kelly Mantle tells THEGAYUK that online trolls told her to kill herself after appearing on the show.
Drag Queen Kelly Mantle told THEGAYUK’s Jake Hook that online trolls told her to kill herself and how much they hated her after her appearance in series 6 of the reality show, RuPaul’s Drag Race.
The online abuse came thick and fast for the LA based film star despite only appearing in one episode of the sixth series of Drag Race in 2014.
“I started getting all these tweets saying, ‘I hate you, I can’t stand you, I wish you would go kill yourself.’ I’m like, “Oh, my goodness. Wow. These people feel really strongly about this.’
“This is a serious epidemic… which I never even knew existed before I got on Drag Race, but obviously it does exist.”
Kelly notes that the online abuse just doesn’t stop at RuPaul’s Drag Race contestants however, speaking about some of the abuse that Madonna receives Kelly noted,
“She’ll post a picture on Instagram and you’ll read the comments. Ageism is something I’ve just never understood.I can wrap my head around racism. I can wrap my head around homophobia because it comes out of fear, of not knowing whatever.
“People don’t like something that’s different than them and chances are, they may never become that thing that they’re not liking.
Ageism is so strange to me because we’re all going to get old.”
Kelly Mantle released a single last year to bring about more attention to online bullying and abuse called “Keyboard Courage”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-VxDX8bMejM