Irish actor Barry Keoghan has deactivated his Instagram in response to the harassment of himself and his family after his reported break-up with the pop star Sabrina Carpenter, accusing fans of “crossing a line” and knocking on his grandmother’s door.
In a lengthy statement posted on X, the Oscar-nominated Irish actor wrote: “I can only sit and take so much. My name has been dragged across the internet in ways I usually don’t respond to. I have to respond now because it’s gettin’ to a place where there are too many lines being crossed. I can no longer let this stuff distract from my family and my work.”
The Saltburn star, who has a two-year-old son with a former partner, said he had deactivated his Instagram account after receiving messages containing “absolute lies, hatred, disgusting commentary about my appearance, character, how I am as a parent and every other inhumane thing you can imagine ... Talking about how I was a heroin baby and how I grew up and dragging my dear mother into it also”.
Keoghan, who has been candid about his difficult childhood in foster care and the death of his mother after struggling with drug addiction, said the harassment extended to his son and grandmother, accusing people of “knocking on my grannies door” and “sitting outside my baby boy’s house intimidating them. That’s crossing a line”.
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It’s not the first time Keoghan has called out online trolls. Speaking on Louis Theroux’s podcast in November, he said: “People love to use my son as ammunition or whatever. And it kind of leads me to stop, the more attention I’ve got lately and the more in the public I’ve become, the less I’ve posted about my child, because I don’t think it’s fair to put my child online.”
Keoghan told Theroux that his son’s absence from social media meant “people draw a narrative and go ‘absent father, shit, deadbeat dad’ and more disgusting things I wouldn’t even repeat. Just the audacity of some people, man, it sickens me and makes me furious.”
In his statement Keoghan, who is filming for Netflix’s Peaky Blinders movie, wrote: “Each and every day I work harder to push myself on every level to be the healthiest and strongest person for that boy. I want to provide opportunities for him to learn, fail and grow. I want him to be able to look up to his daddy, to have full trust in me and know I will have his back no matter what.”
He concluded: “I need you to remember he has to read ALL of this about his father when he is older. Please be respectful to all. Thank u x.”
Keoghan had been in a relationship with Carpenter for almost a year, and appeared in her Please Please Please video clip, until reports of their break-up broke last week. – Guardian
