Bake Off star Candice Brown received death threats for wearing lipstick
Candice Brown has recalled the vile abuse she received from trolls during her time on The Great British Bake Off in 2016.
Speaking on White Wine Question Time, she opened up about the threats she received.
“I got a lot of stick,” she said, “all day every day. I mean I got death threats. I got threatened to be raped. I got threatened to be murdered.”
When asked by podcast host Kate Thornton why people were so awful to her, the baking star said it was due to a variety of strange reasons.
She said: “I wore lipstick, how I spoke, what I wore, because I was smug, because I had shit teeth… and that was hard. And I used to think, gosh, I don't smile and probably one of the reasons I do pout is because I never liked my teeth, so that was that whole reason for that.”
Candice said that while she was able to cope with the abuse, thanks to support from her family and friends, she hates that trolls believe they’re in the right to tweet nasty stuff to people.
She said: “My favourite defence is when they go, 'It's just an opinion'. No, no, no: you're just being bloody horrible. That's not an opinion.”
Read more: Candice Brown opens up about her fertility struggles
Interestingly, she said the whole Bake Off experience was very different for her fellow male bakers, who didn’t seem to receive the same level of trolling online.
“The blokes never got it,” Candice said. “The blokes never got accused of doing anything with the judges to win, but of course 21st century, you wear lipstick or a pair of heels, and instantly you can't do it off your own merit or hard work.”
And Candice believes it was purely hard work that enabled her to win the show, after her husband encouraged her to go “all out”.
“I wasn't the best baker in the tent,” said the former PE teacher. “I always say that I worked so hard and I put everything into it. And when I say everything, I put our savings for a house into it, because I had to work hard.
“Practicing, buying ingredients, buying antiques from France to put my bakes on... I got one chance. Liam said, 'You got one go at this, do it, go all out.'”
Kate Lawler, who appeared alongside Candice on White Wine Question Time, said she couldn’t understand why women can’t be more supportive of each other on social media.
“Trolling comes a lot from women, which is a shame because in this day and age, women should be supporting women,” said Kate. “Women should be encouraging… We should be shouting about our sisters in a positive light.”
Read more: Rachel Riley reveals trolling stress took toll on her pregnancy
Candice revealed that she used to call some of her trolls out. She said: “I'd never ever be nasty or mean back because it's not in my nature to do that and that's probably the one thing that gets me.
“People would say, 'Oh, she looks like a bitch', or 'She looks like those bullies at school', and I'd be like… You've got no idea. That's as far away from what I actually am.”
Kate suggested that everyone could take a bit of her nan’s advice when it comes to commenting on social media:
“My nan always used to say: if you've got nothing nice to say, don't say anything,” she said. “We could all go scroll through social media or see someone on telly and think, 'God he's annoying', or 'She's this’, or ‘She's that' but you would never think to write it down in a tweet and then @ the person – you just wouldn't.”
Listen to Candice Brown and Kate Lawler talk about dogs, their relationships and why appearing on TV was the best thing they ever did on the latest episode of White Wine Question Time. Tune in now on iTunes or Spotify.
