InstagramSocial media can be a tricky beast.
On the one hand, it's incredibly cool how all these apps and share sites connect people all around the world. There's a (hollow) sense of accomplishment that comes from a post amassing a certain amount of likes, too. But there's a darker, oftentimes cruel side of social media that comes from its apparent anonymity—and it's something Paris Jackson knows all too well.
Michael Jackson's 18-year-old daughter, sadly, is no stranger to cyber-bullying. In a 2012 interview with Oprah Winfrey for Oprah's Next Chapter, Paris said online attempts to bring her down "don't really work," but in the years since, she's become vocal about the effect these nasty comments really do have on her.
Earlier today, Paris tackled the topic straight-on in an a thoughtful, impassioned Instagram post. "I realize that a very very large portion of the followers I have are people that highly dislike me and very much enjoy to write negative things about what I say and do," she wrote. "It's alarming and a little scary how a small thing I do blows up because the negative followers try to micromanage and control what I do, and there was something I did to piss them off that they don't agree with..."
Paris noted that "if anyone says something rude or hurtful, their account is blocked." Then, though, these blocked commenters become upset at having been blocked, she explained. It's an unnecessary cycle, for which the wise teenager has a very simple solution: "...if anyone that doesn't like me is following this account, I urge you to please just unfollow."
She acknowledged that while she tries "to do everything I can with love and humor, sometimes it doesn't come across that way"—and for that, she "genuinely apologize(s)." But when it comes to being nasty for the sake of being nasty, Paris won't stand for it.
"I think it's a very black and white, all or nothing type of deal here," wrote Paris, "and if that's the case, I'd rather not be using social media. It's getting crazy again, like it did a few years ago when I took a 3 year break from social media."
Paris finds it "very sad" to read "the ridicule and slander" directed at her online that comes from total strangers, she wrote. We don't blame her either. Celebrity or not, there are real people with real feelings behind every account, and the notion of senselessly demeaning someone else for the sport of it is incredibly saddening.
Chrissy Teigen is a frequent Twitter user who finds herself encountering trolls on the reg. "If you follow me, you know how I how I deal with it, and it's not well," she told Huffington Post Live. "I think the funny thing is when people get mad at me when I respond to them, but sometimes it might be the 500th time that day that I read that similar comment, so yes, maybe I snapped on that one person."
The model and cookbook author's husband John Legend "always says that I'm too big a fan of justice," she said. "I feel like I like to let people know when they've hurt my feelings, and I need them to know that they hurt me."
Robin Williams' daughter Zelda Williams has been hurt by the hateful comments of strangers behind screens, too. After her father's death in 2014, received thousands of messages of support from fans but also some hateful, taunting comments. She took a social media "break" for a while as a result, explaining in an Instagram post, "I will be leaving this account for a but while I heal and decide if I'll be deleting it or not. In this difficult time, please try to be respectful of the accounts of myself, my family and my friends. Mining our accounts for photos of dad, or judging me on the number of them is cruel and unnecessary."
"There are a couple throughout, but the real private moments I shared with him were precious, quiet, and believe it or not, not full of photos or 'selfies,'" she continued. "I shared him with a world where everyone was taking their photo with him, but I was lucky enough to spend time with him without cameras too. That was more than enough, and I'm grateful for what little time I had. My favorite photos of family are framed in my house, not posted on social media, and they'll remain there. They would've wound up on the news or blogs then, and they certainly would now. That's not what I want for our memories together."
All the more reason why it's so important to remember there are real people with real feelings behind every screen. Just be kind online—and IRL, too.