The Circle’s Manrika Khaira demands more action to stop trolls after being sent death threats
Khaira #Khaira
A TV show contestant who was sent chilling death threats wants social media users to be subject to stricter rules.
TikTok star Manrika Khaira, from Walsall, said she was afraid to leave her home and did not get out of bed for three days after receiving vile online abuse when Channel 4’s The Circle aired between mid-March and early April.
The 25-year-old content creator said social media platforms should ensure official identification, such as a driving licence or passport, was used when creating accounts to make users more accountable for their comments.
Manrika was runner-up in The Circle, which sees players in separate apartments use a voice-activated social network in a bid to be the most popular for a £100,000 prize.
Co-star Andy Smith, aged 34 and from Solihull, also received online abuse about his physical condition after he had his bowel removed by surgeons at the age of 18.
The shop owner and entrepreneur backed Manrika’s plea. He said he also wanted to see a “hate forum” set up where screenshots of racist, sexist or homophobic abuse could be posted – with the accounts of those responsible instantly blocked by moderators.
Manrika said she received horrific abuse after scores of social media users criticised her “game player” tactics when fellow contestant Tally Brattle was “blocked” from the TV show.
“I had death threats, my address was leaked on Twitter and posted on Instagram, people were calling me a ‘snake’. I had to turn my Instagram comments off,” Manrika told BirminghamLive.
“I didn’t want to leave the house as I was too scared. It was ridiculous. You sit there and think ‘this is a show’. Tally was on the phone to me all weekend and said: ‘I wish we could say something.’
“It got that bad in such a small space of time up until me and Tally had our meet (within the gameshow) and we made up.
“I had four days of abuse. Once you are labelled that, people will nitpick at absolutely everything – that you are a ‘game player.’
“I deleted Twitter – I didn’t want to be part of it. I had to turn my TikTok comments off. I didn’t want to pick up my phone that weekend. Then it happened with (other players) Gemma, Andy and Vithun.
“When you are made an influencer that many times, whoever you get rid of, you are going to be a villain.
“It got so bad. People genuinely didn’t understand this was a game show. You would not hound the person that beats The Chaser (in ITV’S the Chase).”
The Circle players – who filmed series three in Salford, Manchester, last September – joined forces with a #ThinkB4UPost campaign targeting potential trolling and urged people to be kind before writing their comments.
Manrika, who also launched her own campaign with her management company to clamp down on trolling, has vowed to get social media platforms to address the situation.
“I don’t care if this takes me the rest of my life. This is what I have to work on,” she said.
“I want to get Instagram’s attention. I want to make sure anybody across any social media platform that opens up a social media account has to do it with a form of Government identification that is linked to an address.
“So that if someone sends me a death threat I can report that to police and they can link that to a person and an address.
“It’s an offence to send a death threat or threaten someone. They can then be arrested and prosecuted for it.
“Once that happens people will stop doing it. You wouldn’t walk down the street and say ‘I’m going to kill you’ as it’s an offence.
“But online, people can hide behind a screen and use an account that takes seconds to make.”
Manrika, a former recruitment worker, said said she went on Instagram to see how easy it would be to create a fake account – and timed it at just 48 seconds.
“You can have any username you want and your email is not linked,” she said.
“It took less than a minute. You can imagine most of the accounts that troll me have zero followers, zero posts, zero following.
“They’ve been created just to troll me. I think social media needs to be a safer place. I want to be able to say: ‘I’ve made social media and this world a little bit less of a toxic place.’
“I don’t want this (hate) for the future generation to come. This is online hate – it’s not just reality TV stars or people in the public eye who get trolled – it’s everybody. I’m not stopping until this is done.”
She said the trolling experience had tested her resolve, but she can contact a psychiatrist 24-hours-a-day as part of an aftercare package from the TV show.
Manrika described her Circle experience as an “absolute roller coaster”, but she had “no regrets” about the show.
She said there was no beef with “Felix”, aka Natalya Platonova, 30, after she catfished her way to the title having created a fake romance between the pair.
“We saw each other at the final dinner. I feel like the public expected me to jump across the table like a lion and pull her hair out,” said Manrika.
“You can’t react to a situation without letting that person sit down and let them explain what their motivation was.
“I had my own motivation for doing what I did and I did some very gameplay-like things in there that rubbed a lot of people up the wrong way.
“Until you sit there and know what other people’s motivations are and why they’ve come in, you can’t go in all guns blazing.”
Speaking of her home life, she added: “I’m a Walsall girl. I live here. I’m a Black Country girl. I have a small circle of friends and live on a council estate. Everyone knows everyone and I love it.
“I’m just a normal girl. I’m just trying to make my council estate kingdom smile.”
Dad-of-two Andy, who finished third in The Circle, was a popular figure in the game and has an impressive CV.
He was the general manager venue director at Sheffield United FC at the age of 22, and also worked at Coventry’s Ricoh Arena and used to run Edgbaston cricket ground.
The self-proclaimed “dad of The Circle” spoke of his largely positive experience – but even he found himself on the receiving end of vile comments online.
Andy had ulcerative colitis and had to have his bowel removed as a teenager at Birmingham’s Queen Elizabeth Hospital. He’s been in and out hospital over the last 16 years, yet his condition was singled out by cruel trolls.
Andy, married to wife Holly for eight years, told BirminghamLive: “My game plan was to be a decent person and even I managed to evoke hate (from trolls). I was the most neutral person in the show and I still got it.
“Certainly for me, the others took a harder beating than I did. But the reality is you only need one person to explain four ways in which they wish you died for it to affect you.
“I’d get 5,000 positives messages and ten horrendous ones. The horrendous ones stay with you. I can only imagine what it feels like if you were getting it in day in and day out.
“The irony for me was that when people attacked Manrika they were exhibiting far worse behaviour that what they were witnessing.
“It’s the irony that you are trying to defend someone’s honour – but doing it in the most hateful way possible.
“It’s (being trolled) not anything anyone can prepare you for. No-one would come up to you in the street and say ‘here’s four ways I’d like to see you die.’
“It’s insane to me is that someone would think ‘what I need to do next is send this person lots and lots of hate’.”
Supporting Manrika’s plea for tighter regulations on social media, Andy said: “Trolling is not going to go away. Manrika’s solution is brilliant. I think it’s smart – it regulates. I would love it if everyone that has an account has to give a driving licence or passport (to sign up).
“I personally think the quickest thing that could end it would be to screen grab the hate and there should just be a hate forum on Instagram or Twitter and the moment it gets posted to them they just block that person’s account.
“Yes there’s free speech, but no-one has a right to spread hate. Once you say something like that you can no longer be trusted.
“You could rate and categorise it. Sexism, racism, bigotry – those kind of subject matters and death threats. Even if you took that off the internet it would be a better place.
“It’s not about silencing everyone. People should be free to say what they think, but there’s a line.
“The simplest thing is to take away the person’s ability to say it. You could cull half the issue. It won’t fix it all and there will still be negativity, but for me these issues could be stopped by social media platforms literally overnight.
“If your reason for social media is good why would you mind uploading some ID? That person then has no-where to hide.”
He added: “If trolling is happening regularly the most robust person in the world is going to suffer. It makes you feel sick. Someone meant it. At that moment in time that was real to them. We want to get more people to think about it.
“Social media principally was for good, it was not for bad. I just believe that there’s three, four, five subjects that the entire nation agrees is unacceptable, so let’s take them away.”
Describing his experience of The Circle, Andy said: “There were real highs and lows. The Circle is better than you expect, worse than you expect, more exciting than you expect. It’s all extremes – there’s no middle.
“It’s a brilliant experience and for me it was the best way to take a month off my life.”
The latest series of The Circle can be downloaded on All 4 now.