MyKayla Skinner Asks Simone Biles to “Put a Stop” to Cyberbullying After Viral Olympic Post
Keeping up with the drama between MyKayla Skinner and Simone Biles?
Well, there’s been a new development since the U.S. women’s gymnastics team brought home the Gold in the Paris 2024 Olympics. Biles celebrated the win with a bunch of photos of the squad along with the caption: “lack of talent, lazy, Olympic champions ❤️🥇🇺🇸”. She seemed to be quoting the controversial comments made by the 2020 Olympic silver medalist Skinner.
“Besides Simone, I feel like the talent and the depth just isn’t like what it used to be,” Skinner said in a now-deleted YouTube video in June. “Just notice like, I mean, obviously a lot of girls don’t work as hard. The girls just don’t have the work ethic.”
After facing backlash, Skinner posted a video saying that her viewers “misinterpreted or misunderstood exactly what I was meaning or had said.”
That didn’t fly, so she issued an apology on her Instagram three days later on July 6.
“It was not my intention to offend or disrespect any of the athletes or to take away from their hard work. Your hard work and dedication has paid off and I congratulate each and every one of you,” she wrote. Adding, “Upon reflection, I was comparing the ‘Marta Era’ to the current era. I am coming to terms that I have not fully dealt with the emotional and verbal abuse I endured under Marta that perhaps led to my hurtful comments. I take full responsibility for what I said and I deeply apologize.”
You’d think that was a wrap, right? Wrong.
“Simone’s latest post and others that followed it field another wave of hateful comments, DMs, articles, and emails, hate that includes death threats to me, my family, and even my agent,” the former gymnast continued, digging up ghosts of ages past.
“My family and my friends don’t deserve to be caught in a crossfire here. They’ve done nothing,” she added.
“To Simone, I am asking you directly and publicly to please put a stop to this. Please ask your followers to stop. You have been an incredible champion for mental health awareness, and lot of people need your help now. We’ve been hurt and attacked in ways that I am certain you never intended,” she elaborated.
“Your performance, your team’s performance, and the Olympics, in general, should be a time that we support one another and lift each other and our country up. I love our country, and I love our team, and I hope that we can move on and move forward and cheer on the rest of our teammates and our athletes together.”
