Fifth Harmony Member Normani Kordei Opens Up About Being Bullied Online

Fifth Harmony member Normani Kordei recently shared shocking details regarding her experience with cyberbullying.

On Monday night’s episode of “Dancing With the Stars” Season 24, the 20-year-old said that she was bullied by internet users after something she said in one of her interviews was taken out of context. Talking about her routine during week 8, Kordei said that her contemporary number with pro partner Val Chmerkovskiy is so symbolic of what she felt and experienced at the time.

Read: Will Normani Kordei win on “Dancing With the Stars” Season 24?

“The piece is so symbolic of time that I’ve felt helpless and desperate. I got bullied terribly on social media. I did an interview. It was taken out of context completely and there were images. People were calling me the N word. It was really ugly. It was every time I went online it’s, ‘Oh, how much we hate you. How talentless you are.’ They actually made images of me being whipped, beaten and hung,” she said.

Kordei continued by saying that she shouldn’t want to change the color of her skin or feel the need to become someone that she’s not. But at the time, she felt really alone. “We all want to be loved. We want to feel accepted, but when that doesn’t happen, then it just breaks you,” she continued.

Following the cyberbullying incident, Kordei admitted that she has become more guarded. However, this does not mean that she will stop living her dream.

But when Kordei and Chmerkovskiy danced on stage, it was obvious how passionate the two were with their routine. This resulted in the dance partners getting a perfect score of 40.

Last year, Kordei was asked about former Fifth Harmony member Camila Cabello during an interview, and her response was taken out of context. Fans of Cabello started bombarding the singer with hate tweets. When Kordei tried to defend herself, Cabello’s fans started calling her an “angry black woman.” Even after Kordei and Cabello herself clarified that they are not feuding with each other, the cyberbullies still didn’t stop taking jabs at her.

In October 2016, Kordei also spoke about the incident during an interview with Essence. She explained that when she was asked to describe the members of Fifth Harmony in one word, she described Ally Hernandez, Dinah Hansen and Lauren Jauregui first. When it was Cabello’s turn to be described, Kordei hesitated for a bit before saying, “She is, let’s see… very quirky. Cute.” Fans of Cabello took offense immediately and started posting mean comments on all of her social media accounts.

“It seemed that my description of Camila wasn’t good enough for some of our fans. My first reaction was, ‘Are you kidding?’ But the negative comments just kept coming. It wasn’t regular bullying. It was harassment,” she said.

Kordei decided to log out of Twitter, and she also deactivated the comments option on her Instagram account. It was only on Sept. 13 that she started using social media again. “This experience just shows me that you can’t really change what people think or what the perception may be. All I need to do is love myself despite the hate I get,” she concluded.