Star Wars actress Kelly Marie Tran quits Instagram after abuse

KELLY Marie Tran has quit Instagram after suffering months of racist and sexist abuse on social media, prompting a fierce backlash from angry Star Wars fans.

STAR Wars actress Kelly Marie Tran has quit Instagram after suffering months of racist and sexist abuse on social media.

The Vietnamese-American actress starred as mechanic-turned-Resistance fighter Rose Tico in 2017’s The Last Jedi.

But she was subjected to abusive comments and harassment from some fans, who took aim at her ethnicity and appearance.

Kelly Marie Tran has quit Instagram after being subjected to racist and sexist abuse.

The film’s director, Rian Johnson, has defended the actress, describing the trolls as “manbabies”.

He wrote on Twitter: “On social media a few unhealthy people can cast a big shadow on the wall, but over the past four years I’ve met lots of real fellow Star Wars fans.

Kelly Marie Tran with John Boyega in The Last Jedi.

“We like & dislike stuff but we do it with humour, love & respect. We’re the VAST majority, we’re having fun & doing just fine.”

Angry supporters of Tran took to Twitter to denounce the trolls.

Temporarily breaking twitter silence bc I’m very, very angry Kelly Marie Tran was harassed by these ghouls. I’m sorry this entire fandom is harassed by them.

— Claudia Gray (@claudiagray) June 5, 2018

first y’all made daisy ridley delete her instagram and now all of kelly marie tran’s ig posts are gone, im truly going to fight every single one of you

— cady 🏳️‍🌈✨ (@poesrogue) June 3, 2018

@ Kelly Marie Tran - we love you and you deserve so much better ♡♡ pic.twitter.com/QJ8IPNm6ho

— ㅤㅤㅤ (@REYSBENSOLOS) June 5, 2018

Kelly Marie Tran is a goddamn treasure and I will not hear otherwise.

— Ashly Burch (@ashly_burch) June 5, 2018

I was lucky enough to meet Kelly Marie Tran briefly, and she was incredibly nice to a comics writer who may have been geeking out a bit too much. It's fine to not like fictional characters. It's not fine to harass actual human people. https://t.co/sti2my7zdD

— Jody Houser ✒️🗯️🎲 (@Jody_Houser) June 5, 2018

Kelly Marie Tran's quote on her Instagram page -- "Afraid, but doing it anyway. 🦁" is a thing I adore without reserve. She is a force for light and joy and unabashed engagement with the things you love, and to think of the harassment she's received is infuriating.

— Chuck Wendig (@ChuckWendig) June 5, 2018

It’s no exaggeration to say Kelly Marie Tran’s line in The Last Jedi

"That's how we're gonna win. Not fighting what we hate, saving what we love”

...changed my life.

Be good to each other. Pump up the things you love, don’t destroy the things you hate.

— Alex Zalben (@azalben) June 5, 2018

The California-born Tran, 29, has deleted all her Instagram posts, leaving a line in her biography that reads “Afraid, but doing it anyway”.

The news comes after Tran’s Last Jedi co-star Daisy Ridley, who plays Rey, last year revealed she had quit Instagram.

Ridley said social media was “highly unhealthy for people’s mental health”.

“I don’t do social any more. I came off it last September and I will never get back on,” she told Radio Times.

“It’s such a weird thing for young people to look at distorted images of things they should be.”