The delicate and famous actress Mawra Hocane has revealed her disheartened experience on social media that she once decided to quit acting due to so much trolling.
In a recent conversation with actor and host Mira Sethi, Hocane relayed how her experience with social media gradually led her to grow afraid, and then that fear never left.
Read more: Social Media: The problem solver or a creator?
“I didn’t know a thing about Instagram, even though people credit me for being one of the first celebs to join it and start some sort of trend. For me it was just something I just enjoyed using. I was 19 when I started working. So I’d take pictures on the sets of my projects and upload them,” recalled the 28-year-old starlet.
She reminisced how her co-stars would often inquire what she was doing, to which she’d tell them about ‘this app called Instagram’. “They all would just weird out because nobody thought it would become so big,” Mawra Hocane continued.
But when asked about how toxic social media can be considering the importance it has been given today, especially for actors, Hocane replied, “Like I said, when I had started working, Instagram was just another app. But as time went on, people started asking me to use this ‘platform’ to educate other actors and people. And I would tell them, social media, without us, is nothing.”
The Sanam Teri Kasam actor then recalled, “You can’t even think about making a mistake, because you have been placed on a pedestal where you can’t say anything wrong. So the first time this hit me I was like, I want to stop using it. I want to stop acting and I just want to leave. And I actually went to Sydney and told my parents ‘I don’t want to do this anymore’.”
“I told my parents people here want to kill me because I said something wrong. And even today I don’t want to defend myself, I am scared of it. I say ‘you know what? I am wrong! But are you really going to take my life for it?’” asked Mawra Hocane.
She continued to relay how all the hate eventually disheartened her so much that she started giving standard responses in all her interviews. “Are you still afraid?” asked Mira. “I think that fear has never left,” concluded the Jawani Phir Nahi Ani 2 actor.
