General Hospital has leapt to the defense of its actress Tabyana Ali after she was lambasted by racist trolls on social media.
The 22-year-old joined the soap opera in 2022, taking over the role of Trina, whose previous actress left the show in order to devote her full energy to college.
In recent months Tabyana Ali, who is black, has been deluged with vicious online comments targeting her for her ethnicity.
Earlier this month she issued her own response, graciously writing that she was ‘sending you peace, safety, and prosperity.’
Now the Instagram account for General Hospital has put out a statement saying: ‘General Hospital does not tolerate hatred or bigotry of any kind. Racism has no place in Port Charles. #GH is for everyone.’
Port Charles is the fictional city in New York State that serves as the setting for General Hospital, the longest-running soap opera still on the air.
The statement from the show comes less than two weeks after Tabyana Ali delivered her response to the trolls on X, formerly known as Twitter.
‘To anyone that hates me. That’s absolutely fine. I don’t know you and you don’t me but regardless I’m sending you peace, safety, and prosperity…,’ she wrote.
‘I also pray you touch some grass, see the sun, eat a delicious meal, and find something to do. Peace and love,’ she concluded.
A couple of hours later she returned to the platform to provide her take on how one should cope with being the target of racist remarks.
‘Okay this is the last time I’m going to speak on this today but we cannot be feeding in to peoples hate. We cannot be giving it back,’ she argued.
‘We cannot stoop to rude/racist people’s level. It doesn’t help. We are fighting too many wars as it is. I believe we will have our world peace But we got to find another way to fight,’ Tatyana continued in a four-part thread.
‘I’ve realized ignoring doesn’t help but neither does giving the energy back. We’re going in circles and that doesn’t get us anywhere. Everybody might not agree with me but thats okay. I just want to let “those” people know, I see you,’ she added.
‘And Im sorry that this is the away you feel like you have to be seen. I’m sorry that life isn’t happening how you want,’ Tabyana noted.
‘But if you found something you loved to do other than hurting people.
You would never have the energy to say what you’ve been saying to people ONLINE!’
She went on: ‘I promise life is more beautiful and peaceful and full when you give people and yourself LOVE. I pray you don’t meet God and find yourself disappointed when he shows you the life you could’ve had, if all you had to do was stop giving out that type of energy and just went OUTSIDE!’
General Hospital has been on the air since 1963, with countless characters wafting in and out of the medical drama’s universe in Port Charles, New York.
The character of Trina Robinson was first introduced to the show in 2017 and was initially played by Tiana Le, followed by Sydney Mikayla.
Trina is a fun-loving teenager and the warmhearted best friend of Josslyn Jacks, a character played by Eden McCoy.
Sydney announced in March 2022 that she was leaving the show so that she would be able to dedicate her full attention to college.
‘I have loved working on General Hospital, but I feel like this is the right time to dive in and enjoy my college experience to the fullest,’ she told Soap Opera Digest.
‘The cast has become family and bringing the character of Trina to life has been one of the best experiences of my career thus far.’