Gautami Kapoor Opens Up on Mental Health Toll of Social Media Trolling

Gautami Kapoor, the actor known for her work in films like The Bastards of Bollywood, found herself at the center of a firestorm that she never anticipated. Four and a half months after recording a podcast episode, a comment she made about her parenting choices—specifically, gifting a sex toy to her sixteen-year-old daughter—suddenly erupted across social media. What followed was not debate. It was a deluge of vitriol that left her unable to sleep, unable to open her phone, and unable to imagine that strangers could write such things to another human being.

In interviews reflecting on the experience, Kapoor was clear about what she had actually said and what she had not. She had not issued a manifesto about how all mothers should parent. She had not generalized her choices into universal prescription. She had spoken about her own relationship with her own child during a particular conversation on a particular day. Yet the distinction seemed to matter little to the thousands of people who descended on her social media feed with judgment and condemnation. She described entering a depressed state of mind, scrolling through comments so brutal that she eventually abandoned Instagram altogether for nearly six weeks. Her husband, actor Ram Kapoor, and their daughter—who studies in the United States—both encouraged her to speak publicly about the experience. Her daughter's response was notably different from her mother's: she saw the outrage as noise, as the inevitable churn of social media that would fade in days. Ram suggested his wife had nothing to fear in telling her story. But Kapoor ultimately chose silence, not out of weakness, but out of a need to protect herself from further psychological erosion.

What Kapoor experienced is not unusual, according to psychotherapist and life coach Delnna Rrajesh, who has observed a pattern in how society responds when parents speak openly about progressive values, sexuality, boundaries, or modern approaches to child-rearing. The outrage, Rrajesh explains, does not stem from reason. It emerges from fear—fear rooted in cultural conditioning and unresolved discomfort around autonomy, particularly female autonomy. In Indian society, parenting remains treated as community property. Children are viewed not as individuals with evolving identities but as extensions of family honor. When a parent publicly breaks that unspoken contract by admitting to openness, trust, or progressive dialogue at home, it destabilizes the moral order that many people depend on to feel safe. That destabilization often transforms into aggression.

What follows is rarely an exchange of ideas. Trolling does not argue; it invades. It attacks the body, the character, the morality, and eventually the mental health of the person on the receiving end. Rrajesh describes the psychological cascade: sleepless nights, withdrawal, anxiety, depressive spirals, a deep sense of betrayal. When hundreds or thousands of strangers question your integrity, your worth as a woman, your fitness as a parent, the nervous system enters survival mode. Hypervigilance sets in. Sleep disturbances follow. Rumination intensifies. Self-doubt creeps in even when logic insists otherwise. Many people underestimate the damage because the abuse exists only online, but the brain does not differentiate between physical and digital threats. Shame registers as pain. Humiliation registers as danger. The cruelty is compounded when children are dragged into the discourse, forced to become collateral damage in a moral panic.

Silence, in such moments, is often mistaken for capitulation. In reality, Rrajesh notes, it is a self-preservation strategy—a form of containment, not cowardice. Choosing not to respond is sometimes the only way to protect one's mental health from further erosion. Yet there is a generational dimension to this struggle that deserves attention. Many children and young adults today have developed a healthier relationship with digital noise. They understand the fleeting nature of outrage. They know how quickly attention moves on to the next target. For them, online judgment does not automatically translate into self-worth. Parents, however—especially those who did not grow up in an age of constant visibility—often internalize online hate more deeply. They remain wired to equate public opinion with social survival, a calculus that made sense in earlier eras but now creates a painful gap between their experience and their children's.

For parents navigating this climate, experts suggest several anchors. Recognize that not every parenting choice needs public validation. Understand that outrage says far more about the unresolved wounds of the outraged than about the parent being targeted. Build emotional boundaries around social media actively—not reading comments is not denial, it is regulation. Have open conversations with children about digital noise, helping them understand that public opinion is not a moral compass. And remember, finally, that parenting is not a performance. It is a relationship. Kapoor's experience, painful as it was, illuminates a broader truth: the internet has given voice to judgment, but it has not made judgment wise.