Star Wars Actor Kelly Marie Tran On The 'Spiral Of Self-Hate' Social Media Trolls Caused

A lot has been mentioned about social media toxicity in the wake of some high-profile users deactivating their accounts in recent months. In June, Star Wars: The Last Jedi star Kelly Marie Tran, 29, deleted all the photographs on her Instagram right after months of racially charged harassment; a number of weeks later, Stranger Things breakout Millie Bobby Brown, 14, logged off Twitter right after becoming the face of homophobic memes.


For females, especially females of color, navigating social media can be a mentally taxing and some days unhealthy experience. Right now, Tran is speaking out about her choice to leave social media altogether.


"Their words seemed to confirm what growing up woman and also a person of color already taught me: that I belonged in margins and spaces, valid only as a minor character in their lives and stories," she wrote in an essay for The New York Times. "Their words reinforced a narrative I had heard my whole life: that I was 'other,' that I didn’t belong, that I wasn’t good enough, simply because I wasn’t like them."


The Vietnamese-American actress starred as Resistance heroine Rose Tico in Rian Johnson's Star Wars: The Last Jedi, a role that has difference the virtue of being the beloved franchise's first woman of color in a lead role. Her groundbreaking efficiency was celebrated, although her effervescent personality is what really endeared her to a legion of fans. No one has ever been happier to be promoting a Star Wars film than Tran, a lifelong fan of the Skywalker saga.


But Johnson's boldly feminist take on Star Wars also instigated backlash. Johnson and Tran procured the brunt of the vitriol, harassed by nameless and faceless trolls who didn't like the film and Rose's history-making role in it.


"For months, I went down a spiral of self-hate, into the darkest recesses of my mind, places where I tore myself apart, where I put their words above my own self-worth," Tran wrote.


That is, up until she realized that she does deserve to be the center of her own story, the hero on the cover of Vanity Fair. "I desire to stay in a global where children of color don’t spend their entire adolescence wishing to be white. I'd like to stay in a global where ladies are not subjected to scrutiny for their appearance, or their actions, or their general existence," she added. "I wish to stay in a global where people of all races, religions, socioeconomic classes, sexual orientations, gender identities and abilities are seen as what they have habitually been: humans


Change doesn't happen overnight; Star Wars taught us that. Rebellions begin slow, then swell into something fierce and undeniable. And it's clear that Cash advance Kelly Marie Tran is leading a revolution of her very own — and she's just getting began.


Below, watch Cole Sprouse, Amandla Stenberg, Hailee Steinfeld, and more celebs talk about staying sane on social media with MTV News.