Pia Wurtzbach recounts worst experience using Twitter: 'I was stalked and ridiculed for years'
Warning: This story has mentions of sexual abuse
After creating an account on the new social media app Threads, Pia Wurtzbach took the time to recall some of her worst experiences on using the rival platform Twitter.
Threads is the latest text-based platform where users can share anything on their minds.
Pia, for instance, published a post encouraging her followers to share the worst things that have happened to them on using Twitter.
"I'll go first," wrote Pia before recounting her own bad experience. "Getting hate tweets literally every 30 seconds in 2020 when I voiced out my opinion on the Anti-Terror Bill."
To recall, the Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020 or RA 11479 was passed to "prevent, prohibit, and penalize terrorism in the Philippines." However, many have expressed their opposition towards it, pointing out that the broad and vague definition of "terrorism" could cause confusion when it comes to implementation and could possibly be used by the government to punish its critics.
"I remember not even shading the govt or the president, I just tweeted a hashtag and got so much hate. One of the worst was 'sasaksan ko ng tubo p*ke mo, bobo ka walang alam,'" Pia detailed.
The harassment escalated to the point where the model and actress decided to uninstall the app for a week to avoid checking the hateful messages.
But that's not all.
"I also remember being stalked and ridiculed by a certain account for years. And regularly too," Pia shared.
She continued, "This person was reading into every single post, comment, video I was doing on every platform, including all my family and close friends. They would also message the endorsements and brands I work with to destroy me with made up narratives. It was wild."
Despite reporting the account many times with clear evidence, Pia claimed that Twitter did nothing to solve her problem.
"It was clearly slander and abusive behavior. I had to sit there and take it for years," she wrote.
Many of her followers empathized with her and began to share similar encounters with harassers. One user recalled that when they also voiced their opposition towards the the Anti-Terrorism Act, they received threatening messages that they were going to be sexually abused.
In response to the user, Pia revealed that she also got these kinds of messages.
"I got rape threats too! [H]onestly kahit sabihin mo pa na they are just words on a screen, nakaka-anxiety talaga! I remember being really terrified for my safety during that time! But I guess yun ang goal nila, is takutin ka into silence. No healthy discussions, no trying to educate you instead. Just vile hateful comments," Pia wrote.
With the new Threads app, the beauty queen is hopeful that netizens will only spread positive vibes on the platform.
"Finally, a place where we can write down our thoughts and not get death threats for having an opinion. Hopefully, Meta can keep this app troll-free," she wrote in her first Threads post.
The app was officially launched on July 6 on iOS and Android app stores. In just a few hours, million of users have already signed up to the platform.