Nessa Barrett defends TikTok ‘scar girl’ from “bullying and harassment”

TikTok star Nessa Barrett came to the defense of ‘scar girl,’ a creator on the platform who received criticism after viewers became convinced her facial scar wasn’t real.

Influencer Ann Bonelli has risen to the top of TikTok fame over the past few weeks due to a unique facial scar she has on her left cheek.

Although older photos of the creator show her with a reddish, faded scar, her scar has become much darker in her more recent posts — which some viewers aren’t convinced is actually real.

Lately, Bonelli (now colloquially known as ‘scar girl’) has been taking fire for purportedly “faking” an injury and even playing a “bit” for social media. Bonelli, though, says she was originally injured in 2020 and worsened her scar by using a topical lightening cream that gave her a “chemical burn.”

That isn’t stopping netizens from levying a critical eye at her, though… but another prominent influencer is coming to her defense.

Nessa Barrett defends ‘scar girl’ after TikToker receives wave of criticism

On January 17, TikTok star and singer-songwriter Nessa Barrett took to Twitter to defend ‘scar girl,’ claiming Bonelli was being unfairly “harassed and bullied” over her facial feature.

“I don’t get the whole ‘scar girl’ thing, but I feel for her because she’s getting so much hate,” she wrote in a series of now-deleted posts. “Fake or not, she doesn’t deserve the bullying and harassment.”

“I just think about it, and if you wanted to fake it to make it last, it’s pretty easier to make it look real, and I’m sure she’s smart enough to do so,” she continued. “What girl would rather have a thick, brown line on her face than a healed scar? I swear, it doesn’t make sense.”

“What’s wrong with social media is that we are harassing a girl because of a scar and not using all of that energy toward people that actually deserve to have their platform removed.”

Commenters on social media don’t seem to be in agreement with her, though. A slew of comments from Instagram tea page ‘TeaTokTalk’ are hitting back at Barrett for her thoughts on ‘scar girl,’ even saying that Barrett deserves to be deplatformed after her viral incident dancing to audio of the Quran being read aloud in 2020.

Barrett has since deleted her tweets on the subject and posted a lengthy reply to the criticism she received in an Instagram comment, where she reiterated her support for Bonelli and called out online negativity.

Bonelli, for her part, continues to claim that her facial injury is real and makes multiple posts about body positivity on her account in spite of the constant criticism she sees in her comments.