The abuse is shocking.
@Ireland is a brilliant twitter account, which is run by a new person each week.
The idea is for the account to be taken over by different types of people, with different types of lives and professions, to give an insight into the diverse country Ireland is.
When plus size model and mother, Michelle Marie, took over the account this week, she received a shocking response from some Twitter users.
Michelle is English and she is black; this, combined with the fact that she is a plus size model, lead to many people sending her abuse while she ran the account.
Here's a perfect example of the trolling I receive on a regular basis. It's what spurs me on to keep doing what I do https://t.co/ON05813BbI
— Ireland / Rohana – LeCheileDND (@ireland) August 22, 2016
While Michelle took over the account to initially discuss her modelling and parenting it was only a few hours until the abuse began to come in.
After sharing this tweet Michelle went back to discussing her views on fat-shaming. But, sadly, the abuse continued.
https://twitter.com/RebeccahLouise/status/767762197833453568?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Michelle addressed the problem once again.
A few people are finding issue with me being black and running the Ireland account, so let me just address that for a minute…
— Ireland / Rohana – LeCheileDND (@ireland) August 22, 2016
I am not an Irish citizen or of Irish descent. Correct. But I do live in Ireland and this account is to represent all residents here.
— Ireland / Rohana – LeCheileDND (@ireland) August 22, 2016
Black people can live in any country they like. We can read and write. We are educated. We can work. We can even tweet. I know, shocking.
— Ireland / Rohana – LeCheileDND (@ireland) August 22, 2016
Thankfully a huge number of people tweeted the account in support for Michelle.
Big thank you to all those standing up to the prejudice I'm facing. All I can think is wait til they find out I'm gay as well 😂
— Ireland / Rohana – LeCheileDND (@ireland) August 22, 2016
We spoke to Michelle about her experience while running the @Ireland account.
“I followed the @Ireland account for a couple of years and I’ve seen that it seems to be prone to a lot of trolling, so I had prepared myself for some negativity and trolling to a certain extent, but I wasn’t at all prepared for what I actually received,” she explained
“It kind of came from nowhere, I hadn’t even really begun tweeting when it started so it was literally just my picture that sparked it. I’d seen that other non-Irish and people of colour had done it before me, so I didn’t think that it would be any particular issue with me doing it.”
Michelle said that while she knew there was a risk of abuse, she was still shocked by the ferocity of the insults she received. She said: “We know that racism is out there, but it was the level of it…it was just so extreme and so nasty, and it really shocked me.”
https://twitter.com/ChocCurvesModel/status/765211730628730880
Michelle, who initially planned to talk about her body positivity campaigning among other things, was upset to see that the racism discussion became the focus.
“I feel frustrated that the race issue has taken over, because I didn’t think that in this day and age that it would be such a talking point still.
“So that’s frustrating but it’s clearly something that still needs to be discussed so I’m glad to do my bit for that, and hopefully it’s raised some awareness opened some eyes. And hopefully some good can come of all of this.”
https://twitter.com/ChocCurvesModel/status/757167009096499200
Although she is happy to have taken over the account, Michelle said that she is glad that the abuse is just on the Twitter account for her.
“I think I feel mainly glad that this has been a one-off and it has been online and anonymous. And from the feedback I’ve heard back from this it’s actually been mainly people from America [tweeting abuse].
“I do want to just say that in my day to day life I have not experienced any racism while being in Ireland so it is a minority, but it has opened my eyes to the fact that racism is still a big issue.”
Speaking of her overall experience curated @Ireland, Michelle said:
“I’m trying to hold onto the positivity. For some people racism is still a regular experience. There are still some people who feel this level of hate on a regular level.
“I feel that as a society as a whole we still need to make a lot of changes so that there isn’t so much hatred.”
Michelle is still curating the @Ireland account for the next week, and we look forward to hearing more about her interesting life.
You can follow her personal account @ChocCurvesModel.
