It's never great when you find out a celebrity that you love turns out to be … well,
not very nice to other people. When the news of Chrissy Teigen's harassment of fellow celebs on
Twitter hit the tabloids, it's safe to say that her fans were more than just a little shocked.
She was once the queen of Twitter, and now it seems that she's been dethroned.
The question everyone has on their lips is, has the world forgiven her? And more importantly,
does she deserve its forgiveness? Please be warned that this video
isn't for the faint-hearted, and we will be mentioning several sensitive topics.
Stay tuned while we break down exactly what happened to cause Chrissy's fall from her fans'
graces. Don't forget to subscribe to Rumour Juice and hit that notification bell too!
Teigen was recently exposed for sending shockingly nasty messages to other women on social media,
telling TV personality Courtney Stodden in 2011 to "Go. To sleep. Forever." and
mocking Lindsay Lohan, who has admitted to harming herself in the past, by tweeting
"Lindsay adds a few more slits to her wrists when she sees Emma Stone."
And in 2013, Teigen publicly called "Teen Mom" star Farrah Abraham "a whore."
Chrissy's actual claim to widespread adoration - until recently, that is - came from the fact that
she was good at Twitter. When we mean "good" at it, we mean she was hilarious. Her feed is full of
funny, candid, uncensored jokes that make her just that more relatable to all of her fans out there,
except that they're not a runway model married to EGOT-winner John Legend.
One thing about Teigen's jokes is that they do sometimes come at the expense of other people.
Specifically ex-president Donald Trump. Her witty Trump insults were so widely
applauded by progressives that Trump once went on his own Twitter rampage about her and then
proceeded to block her. Can you imagine being blocked by the president of the United States?
Clearly, Chrissy's tweets hit a soft spot.
A friend of Teigen framed the tweets that made him mad, and Teigen put them on display in her house.
Earlier this year, however, TV personality Courtney Stodden - who identifies as
nonbinary - pointed out a dark side to Teigen's refreshingly unfiltered and hilarious feed…
Stodden first became famous in 2011, when at the age of 16,
they married 50-year-old acting coach Doug Hutchison . Stodden and Hutchinson
subsequently divorced a few years later, and it's clear that during their marriage,
Stodden was a minor who was being taken advantage of by an adult man.
However, in 2011, Stodden was widely considered to be someone ridiculous and mockable,
someone whose feelings others didn't seem to take into consideration. People called them "the child
bride" and made vicious jokes at their expense. As it turned out, Chrissy was one of those people,
and she didn't hold herself back from tweeting her nasty and cruel opinions about Courtney.
Stodden spoke about Teigen in an Instagram video in 2021, "I experienced so much harassment and
bullying from her when I was just 16 years old. At a time when I needed help. I was being abused."
What's more, Stodden added, neither Teigen nor any of the other big names who pilloried them
"sought to apologize or send any kind of love my way."
Stodden revealed multiple tweets Teigen sent to them at the beginning of the 2010s.
"my Friday fantasy: you. dirt nap. mmm baby," Teigen tweeted at Stodden in 2011.
In another tweet, she simply wrote, "I hate you."
"It really affected me," Stodden said in their Instagram video.
"It's so damaging when you have somebody like Chrissy Teigen bullying children."
This isn't the first time Stodden has called out Teigen, either. When Chrissy briefly deactivated
her Twitter account in March, she explained that the negativity had become too much for her:
"For years I have taken so many small, 2-follower-count punches that at this point,
I am honestly deeply bruised," Teigen wrote. "Never forget that your words
matter. No matter what you see, what that person portrays, or your intention."
This announcement struck Stodden as outrageously hypocritical.
In May, Stodden discussed Teigen's bullying in an interview with the Daily Beast,
adding that in addition to publicly harassing them on Twitter,
Teigen had also occasionally direct-messaged Stodden, telling them to kill themselves.
Like any scandal, the news spread like wildfire, and the tabloids couldn't get enough of it.
And naturally, brands began distancing themselves from Teigen. Multiple retailers decided to drop
Teigen since the tweets resurfaced. In May, "Page Six" reported that Bloomingdale had
decided to end a contract it was set to sign with Teigen because of the recent press.
Just days later, Teigen's cookware line, 'Cravings,' disappeared from Macy's website.
Macy's has made no statement as to why the line had disappeared, but figures like
Candace Owens celebrated the move, claiming it to be Teigen getting what she deserved.
'Safely, 'the cleaning supply brand that Teigen launched with Kris Jenner and Emma Grede,
announced that Teigen would be distancing herself from the company for the time being.
"Chrissy will be stepping away from Safely to take much needed time to
focus on herself and be with her family," the brand wrote.
Page Six declared Teigen an "undercover bully," and even SNL couldn't avoid the
scandal when Pete Davidson joked that "getting Chrissy Teigen out of
our lives" was one of the only good things about the past year. - Owch. Shots fired.
The Cut had an overview of the story, and so did Vulture and Slate. USA Today had an op-ed about
it. There's no doubt that what happened between Teigen and Stodden was all over the internet.
Chrissy did what she did best and took to Twitter to apologize, "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 behavior but that is nothing compared to how I made Courtney feel." However, despite her
very public apology, Stodden claimed that they hadn't heard from her or her reps directly.
On June 14, Teigen published a post on Medium once again apologizing for her past tweets.
"I won't ask for your forgiveness, only your patience and tolerance,"
she wrote. "I ask that you allow me, as I promise to allow you,
to own past mistakes and be given the opportunity to seek self improvement and change."
Stodden acknowledged Teigen's tweets and responded via Instagram with a
screenshot showing that the model had subsequently blocked her on Twitter.
"I accept her apology and forgive her. But the truth remains the same,
I have never heard from her or her camp in private. In fact, she blocked me on Twitter. All
of me wants to believe this is a sincere apology, but it feels like a public attempt to save her
partnerships with Target and other brands who are realizing her 'wokeness' is a broken record."
Since then, Teigen hasn't revisited the incident.
However, her apology prompted more allegations of harassment in the past.
Shortly after Teigen's Medium essay was published, Project Runway designer Michael Costello
released a statement on Instagram detailing what he describes as Teigen's past attempt
to ruin his career, an experience which he says left him "traumatized, depressed," and suicidal.
He said that in 2014, Teigen left a comment on his Instagram accusing him
of racism after seeing a Photoshopped image in which Costello appeared to use a racial slur.
When he tried to reach out to Teigen to explain the image was fake, and he was "the
victim of vindictive cyber slander," she didn't believe him. "She told me that my career was over
and that all my doors will be shut from there on," he wrote. "And wow, did she live up to her words.
Teen Mom's Farrah Abraham also posted her own essay to Medium in response to Teigen's
new apology. In 2013, after Abraham was part of a pornographic film that gained notoriety
and prompted public sex-shaming, Teigen allegedly wrote, in a since-deleted tweet,
"farrah abraham now thinks she is pregnant from her sex tape.
in other news you're a whore and everyone hates you whoops not other news sorry."
In her Medium post, Abraham says she's never received an apology from Teigen:
"As you're asking yourself 'Did Chrissy ever apologize to Farrah,'
hypocritically as such at this time no she has not."
As of now, Stodden does not appear to have spoken publicly about Teigen's new post,
and Chrissy has also remained silent on the matter ever since.
Chrissy Teigen may still be considered 'canceled; however, she's continued to
post regularly on her Instagram, keeping her followers informed on her everyday life.
The question we have is, does she deserve her fans forgiveness? Is this something people can
learn to forgive and forget, or will she never be able to live down the harmful words of her past?
It seems that 'cancel culture' might be unforgiving,
considering the harm she caused with her words. Fans wonder if she'll ever earn
back the seat on her Twitter throne or if there's too much damage to her reputation.