Pink Has No Problem Taking on Her Haters: 'Certain Things Push My Buttons'
Pink has a strong opinion when it comes to internet "trolls" and haters
Pink has a strong opinion when it comes to internet “trolls” and haters.
“Constructive criticism is one thing, and I take that all day long,” she tells PEOPLE in this week’s issue. “But there needs to be some accountability to all this anonymous keyboard warrioring. Certain things push my button. You would never say that to my face. Please, come do it. Let’s talk about it, let’s see who you are.”
Raised in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, Pink, 38, says her father, Jim, instilled a sense of right from wrong in her at a young age.
“My dad’s nickname when I was a kid was ‘Mr. Cause,'” she says. “He would fight any injustice that he could find. If someone was being picked on, if some business wasn’t treating its employees correctly, laws that weren’t fair. I was marching on Washington by the time I was three years old with my dad. He was a letter writer and I saw him change things, change happened.”
What really hit home with the singer was “that one person could make a difference,” she adds. “He raised me with this whole mentality of, ‘To thine own self be true,’ and ‘If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything. Don’t be the sheep.'”
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At times, Pink has taken on her haters and responded to internet trolls “to provide some accountability for people,” she says. “Because that sends a message out there to people that are anonymous and hateful that their rug’s going to get pulled sometimes and publicly. And their account’s going to get shut down because they’re not going to be able to handle it because they’re not as big and bad as they pretend to be.”
It’s a stance she has taken with bullies as well. “My brother was one of the most bullied kids I’ve ever seen. And that broke my heart and I decided not to be powerless about it,” she says. “I couldn’t handle the way that these kids were to him. And so I said, ‘I’m never going to let somebody treat anybody like that. Never ever ever.”
RELATED VIDEO: Pink’s Advice for Raising Strong Kids: “I’m a Truth-Teller”
“I’m so passionate about what I believe in that I become less afraid of what they think about me and more afraid of this thing not changing,” she adds. “It just becomes worth it to me. I don’t like injustice. I can’t stand it.”