Ghostbusters: Leslie Jones suffers racial twitter abuse

Leslie Jones, who plays Patty in the Ghostbusters reboot, has received racial abuse on twitter which has left the actress ‘with tears and a very sad heart’.

The 48-year-old had been sent numerous racist tweets from trolls, including many that compared her to a gorilla:

I just don't understand pic.twitter.com/N9xWoXPttu

— Leslie Jones ? (@Lesdoggg) July 18, 2016

It's so sad,most of these comments sound like they are from ignorant children. "I'm the source of AIDS?!" WTF!! These people hate themselves

— Leslie Jones ? (@Lesdoggg) July 19, 2016

Jones spent much of yesterday, exposing the racists and revealing her disgust and sadness:

Ok I have been called Apes, sent pics of their asses,even got a pic with semen on my face. I'm tryin to figure out what human means. I'm out

— Leslie Jones ? (@Lesdoggg) July 18, 2016

And for all the "don't stoop to their level people" it's way past that. So please have a seat. Don't tell me how to react.

— Leslie Jones ? (@Lesdoggg) July 19, 2016

She then accused Twitter of not doing enough to protect its users:

Twitter I understand you got free speech I get it. But there has to be some guidelines when you let spread like that. You can see on the

— Leslie Jones ? (@Lesdoggg) July 19, 2016

Twitter’s CEO Jack Dorsey replied to Jones, asking her to “DM” him. #LoveForLeslieJ then began trending, while Ghostbusters director Paul Feig also showed his support:

Leslie Jones is one of the greatest people I know. Any personal attacks against her are attacks against us all. #LoveForLeslieJ @Lesdoggg

— Paul Feig (@paulfeig) July 18, 2016

Jones finally had enough as she revealed that the offensive tweets had forced her into actual tears as she described the abuse as a ‘personal hell’:

I feel like I'm in a personal hell. I didn't do anything to deserve this. It's just too much. It shouldn't be like this. So hurt right now.

— Leslie Jones ? (@Lesdoggg) July 19, 2016

I leave Twitter tonight with tears and a very sad heart.All this cause I did a movie.You can hate the movie but the shit I got today…wrong

— Leslie Jones ? (@Lesdoggg) July 19, 2016

A spokesman for Twitter said “its taken action on many of the accounts reported to us by both Leslie and others”. We can only hope that Twitter can crack down on this despicable kind of abuse.