Former U.S. Olympic gymnast MyKayla Skinner has made a heartfelt plea to fellow Olympian Simone Biles to help put an end to the relentless cyberbullying she has endured.
MyKayla Skinner claims she is being bullied online by fans of fellow gymnast Simone Biles ahead of the 2024 Olympics. Skinner took to Instagram to express her emotional distress over the online harassment that she has received in recent weeks.
While the United States Women’s Gymnastics Team finished their ‘Redemption Tour’ in Paris last week, winning eight medals, Mykayla Skinner was silent by what she describes as “online bullying.”
The 2021 Olympic vault silver medallist was rebuked in June for her insensitive comments, which criticized American athletes and the state of the U.S. women’s gymnastics program.
“Besides Simone, I feel like the talent and the depth just isn’t like what it used to be.” Just notice, like, I mean, obviously, a lot of girls don’t work as hard. The girls just don’t have the work ethic,” Skinner said in a YouTube video.
The drama continued when Biles posted a picture of the gymnastics team winning the gold medal at the 2024 Olympics. Many took Bile’s carefully worded but mysterious caption as a jab at Skinner.
The triumphant photo of the team was captioned, “Lack of talent, lazy, Olympic champions ❤️🥇🇺🇸.”
Suni Lee, Nastia Liukin, Dominique Moceanu, and U.S.A. Gymnastics supported the team under Simone Biles’s cryptic post, which quickly spread on social media.
However, with those viral posts, Skinner says her world has quickly changed.
In an Instagram post on Tuesday morning, an emotional Skinner pleaded for the onslaught of “cyberbullying” and online abuse to stop.
Skinner also apologized for her comments and said she takes “100% responsibility for poorly articulating the point I was trying to make.”
“To Simone, I am asking you directly and publicly to please put a stop to this,” Skinner said in Tuesday’s video. “Please ask your followers to stop. You have been an incredible champion for mental health awareness and a lot of people need your help now. We’ve been attacked in ways that I’m certain you never intended.”
Still, fans aren’t enthused that she is trying to drag their G.O.A.T.’s name in a despicable act like cyberbullying.
“Sorry…Simone can’t hear you, bookie. Her gold medals are clanking too loudly. You should’ve just sat there & ate your food,” one user commented.
Another wrote, “And why are you calling on Simone? If you’re getting death threats, you better call the feds.”
Another fan added, “Simone can’t even see this since you blocked her, babe.”
