Jason Manford appears to have deleted his Twitter account, after being confronted with trolls following his comments about the terror attack in Manchester earlier this week.
The comedian, who was born and raised in the Manchester area, was especially moved by the reaction to the bombing, which occurred after an Ariana Grande concert at the M.E.N. arena on Monday (22 May).
Shortly after the news broke, he posted a tearful 40-minute video on Facebook, in which he mourned the 22 victims of the attack, and lamented the fact that his own young children could have been among them, as they are fans of Ariana Grande.
Following this, he also sent a tweet to Ariana, after she said she’d been left “broken” by the news of the attack.
He assured her: “You gave those kids the night of their lives, their hearts were full of joy & happiness &that was because of you. Remember that.”
However, after The Sun reported that the tweet got a mixed reception from his followers, Jason responded: “If you can’t say anything nice, shut the fuck up.”
When one user in particular suggested he should be focusing on the feelings of victims, rather than Ariana, he also hit back: “How childish. I like to think I’m able to feel for all people [affected].”
Shortly afterwards he was forced to address claims that he’d posted his Facebook live video to attract media coverage.
Jason wrote: “I didn’t do [the video] to be reported by the papers and for some people to suggest some quite horrid things… That’s not why I did it and genuine fans know that.”
Since then, he appears to have deleted his Twitter page entirely, though his Facebook account is still active at the time of writing.
He had already used his Twitter account to appeal for information about a family friend, who has been missing ever since the Ariana Grande show.
Jason isn’t the only star to have an emotional reaction to the news of the terror attack, with ‘Good Morning Britain’ host Susanna Reid having a tearful moment as she covered the news on Tuesday’s show, and Manchester-born The 1975 frontman Matt Healy giving an impassioned speech during a live show in Detroit.
Singers such as Katy Perry, Harry Styles, Taylor Swift, Gary Barlow and Nicki Minaj also paid tribute to the innocent victims on their social media accounts.