Billie Eilish has spoken out about some of the cruel trolling she has received online, which ultimately led to her stop reading Instagram comments altogether.
With 54.5 million followers, Billie’s Instagram account makes for a sizeable platform. Although many comments are from supportive fans, her page also attracts a number of people who appear to forget that fame doesn’t make a person immune to hurtful insults or nasty jokes.
Billie Eilish, 18, has now opened up about her choice to stop reading Instagram comments, admitting doing so had been ‘ruining her life’.
Billie explained her decision during an interview on BBC Breakfast, where she appeared alongside her brother and producer, Finneas.
After presenter Louise Minchin asked if she ‘still reads everything on Instagram’, Billie replied:
I stopped like two days ago. Literally two days ago. I stopped reading comments fully.
[…] Because it was ruining my life. Once again. It’s weird. The cooler the things you get to do are, the more people hate you, it’s crazy.
Speaking about what motivates people to become internet trolls, Finneas said:
When you feel that you have no public voice, and somebody does have a public voice, it seems so immeasurable in that equality scale of whose voice is louder.
And you feel like your voice is very quiet. Even though on platforms such as Twitter and Instagram, it can reach them directly.
So I think you might reach someone, a famous celebrity, and you might think, ‘sticks and stones, nothing I can say is actually gonna be potent to them’. But it’s all very equal online.
You can watch Billie’s interview here:
The news comes just days after Tom Holland opened up about taking ‘a break’ from Instagram too, after realising it had been taking over his life.
Although the 23-year-old Spider-Man actor hasn’t deleted his account entirely, he has reportedly removed the app from his phone. And he’s feeling much better for it.
Tom told E! News:
It was taking over my life, and I was becoming obsessed by it. Like, ‘How many likes did I get?’ and ‘What did people say about my picture?’ and who’s doing this and who’s doing that. I found myself focusing more on my Instagram life than I was on my real life.
He added:
Now that I’ve taken a step back and I’ve started to focus on Tom and the future of what Tom is gonna be, I have… I’m talking about myself in the third person, I sound like such a dick, but you know what I mean. I’m just working on myself, and I feel really great for it.
It’s horrible to think that somebody as young as Billie – who we sometimes forget is still just a teenager – is being trolled by people hiding away behind computer screens.
Sadly, she isn’t the only young person to be affected by harmful comments online. According to a 2019 YouGov poll, people between the ages of 18 to 24 are most likely to experience cyberbullying, with 55% of respondents within this age bracket revealing they had been subjected to some sort of online bullying.
If you’ve been affected by bullying and want to speak to someone in confidence, contact Bullying UK (part of Family Lives) on 0808 800 2222. The helpline service is open 9am–9pm Monday to Friday and 10am–3pm Saturday and Sunday.
Jules studied English Literature with Creative Writing at Lancaster University before earning her masters in International Relations at Leiden University in The Netherlands (Hoi!). She then trained as a journalist through News Associates in Manchester. Jules has previously worked as a mental health blogger, copywriter and freelancer for various publications.