Sushant Singh’s suicide: ‘Trolls play a role in actors becoming depressed’

Sushant Singh Rajput’s death by suicide has provoked a socio-cultural debate around Bollywood and its culture.  Thousands of Netizens have taken to social media to troll the Hindi film industry’s culture of nepotism.  While we are at it, it is also important to understand that toxic and abusive trolls, too, play a role in worsening the mental health of the actors they hate.  

A Twitter user says, “Those who mentally harass celebs through abuse, kindly make a note how much your actions affect their mental health.  It’s nothing but hypocrisy on your part to abuse them endlessly and sympathize with their mental depression after they are gone.”

Body-shaming of actors is commonplace on Twitter and Facebook.  People cross the limits of decency and tag the actors who they are trolling.  “This is not done.  It’s one thing to say that you dislike an actor’s looks or performance.  And it’s a wholly different thing to indulge in fat-shaming, passing racist comments, slut-shaming and the like,” a columnist suggests.

“Actors who have been facing setbacks in their career due to a string of flops are particularly vulnerable. Nobody knows their state of mind.  When they read tweets that come with mocking tones/abuses, they lose their morale.  Whether or not we know it, many failed and semi-failed actors go through this pain,” an industry observer once commented informally.