On June 14, 2021, Chrissy Teigen posted a heartfelt note to her social media accounts in which she apologised profusely for her past online behaviour, saying there was “simply no excuse” for her horrible Tweets.
“I was a troll, full stop,” she wrote. “And I am so sorry”.
The note was the first thing Teigen had posted in weeks after being called out for bully-like behaviour in previous years, something which the model has taken full responsibility for. If you’re a little lost on how Teigen went from being the Queen of Twitter to essentially being cancelled, we’re here to catch you up.
What happened with Chrissy Teigen?
Teigen was previously held one of the most-followed Twitter accounts as fans were always eager to hear her hot takes on everything from Trump’s latest blunder and reality TV developments, to her most recent culinary creations and her own personal fails. In fact, Teigen was so unreserved in her savagery toward Trump that she was famously blocked by the former President.
The model and television presenter was also praised for her candid posts about IVF and miscarriage — not to mention her retaliation against the “mummy-shamers” who criticised her every move with her two children, Luna and Miles.
Given that we all enjoyed seeing the swiftness with which Teigen took down trolls, it made it all the more surprising when she was accused of being one herself.
Chrissy Teigen’s Tweets to Courtney Stodden
Reality TV personality Courtney Stodden, who became famous at 16 for marrying 50-year-old Doug Hutchison, was the first to come forward with their story of feeling victimised by Teigen, and they came with receipts — in Tweet form.
“My Friday fantasy: you. dirt nap. mmm baby,” Teigen tweeted at Stodden in 2011. “I hate you,” she wrote in another. According to Stodden, Teigen also privately messaged them telling them, telling Stodden to “kill myself”.
“I experienced so much harassment and bullying from her when I was just 16 years old,” Stodden said in a video uploaded to their Instagram account. “At a time when I needed help. I was being abused.
“It really affected me. It’s so damaging when you have somebody like Chrissy Teigen bullying children.”
Chrissy Teigen’s Tweets to Lindsay Lohan
As it turned out, Stodden was not the only person on the receiving end of Teigen’s past ire, with Lindsay Lohan also having some social media vitriol thrown her way.
“Lindsay adds a few more slits to her wrists when she sees Emma Stone,” Teigen posted about Lindsay Lohan in 2011. The Tweet was wildly inappropriate on every level, and more so because Lohan had been open about her struggles with self-harm.
Teen Mom star Farrah Abrams was also publicly called a “whore” by the supermodel.
Direct Messages With Michael Costello
On June 15, 2021, fashion designer Michael Costello came forward with his account of being bullied by Teigen, revealing that her messages to him had made him severely depressed and suicidal.
“I didn’t want to do this but I can not be happy until I speak my mind,” he wrote in an Instagram post. “I need to heal and in order for me to do that I must reveal what I have been going through. I wanted to kill myself and I still am traumatized, depressed and have thoughts of suicide.”
Costello explained that he had been the victim of a photoshop hoax in 2014, in which it was suggested that he had used a racial slur. Teigen, who believed the accusations to be real, publicly accused him of being racist.
“When I reached out to Chrissy Teigen to communicate that I was the victim of a vindictive cyber slander, and that everything she thought I was is not who I am, she told me that my career was over and that all my doors will be shut from there on,” Costello wrote.
After exchanging direct messages in which Costello begged for the chance to tell his side of the story, and Teigen refusing to hear it, the model eventually told him that “racist people like you deserve to suffer and die. You might as well be dead. Your career is over, just watch.”
Costello claims that she was true to her word and that his opportunities in the fashion industry immediately began to dry up.
Instagram has since been able to prove that the racist comment was, in fact, false and removed it from the platform, but the damage to Costello’s well-being has remained.
“So many nights I stayed awake, wanting to kill myself,” he wrote. “I didn’t see the point of living. There was no way I can ever escape from being the target of the powerful elites in Hollywood, who actually do have the powers to close doors with a single text. Not only was I the target of cyber defamation, but I was also getting blocklisted in real life.”
Fall-out and apologies
While Teigen’s words were written a decade ago, the severity of her past actions was sufficient to see her cookware line, Cravings, removed from the Macys website and several other lucrative endorsement deals get pulled.
Teigen first publicly apologised for her past transgressions in a Tweet posted in May 2021, which read:
“Not a lot of people are lucky enough to be held accountable for all their past bullshit in front of the entire world. I’m mortified and sad at who I used to be. I was an insecure, attention-seeking troll. I am ashamed and completely embarrassed at my behaviour but that…
“Is nothing compared to how I made Courtney feel. I have worked so hard to give you guys joy and be beloved and the feeling of letting you down is nearly unbearable, truly. These were not my only mistakes and surely won’t be my last as hard as I try but god I will try!!
“I have tried to connect with Courtney privately but since I publicly fuelled all this, I want to also publicly apologise. I’m so sorry, Courtney. I hope you can heal now knowing how deeply sorry I am.
“And I am so sorry I let you guys down. I will forever work on being better than I was 10 years ago, one year ago, six months ago.”
She then took a step back from social media, before resurfacing on June 14 to apologise more profusely for the people she had harmed with her actions.
“There is simply no excuse for my past horrible tweets,” Teigen wrote. “My targets didn’t deserve them. No one does. Many of them needed empathy, kindness, understanding and support, not my meanness masquerading as a kind of casual, edgy humour.”
Teigen explained that her motivation for the controversial posts stemmed from her own insecurities and that she thought it made her “cool and relatable” if she poked fun at celebrities.
“In reality, I was insecure, immature and in a world where I thought I needed to impress strangers to be accepted.
“I wasn’t just attacking some random avatar, but hurting young women — some who were still girls — who had feelings. How could I not stop and think of that?”
Read more stories from The Latch and subscribe to our email newsletter.