Katie Bradford says her voice was once likened to 'nails on a chalkboard'

Political journalist Katie Bradford has spoken openly about how she's been the victim of online bullying ever since becoming a television journalist. 

The TVNZ reporter was speaking on the latest episode of Duke's The Inside Word that focused on the topic of cyber-bullying.

"Being in the public eye you expect people to say what they like. For example, a couple of weeks ago an ice-cream truck nearly drove into me in Waitangi and a woman on Facebook posted, 'if that truck had hit her, it would have been a write-off'," Bradford recalled.

The Inside Word

Political journalist Katie Bradford says the comments differed depending on which social media platform was used.

"I'm barely five foot for starters so I don't think I would have done much damage to the truck. But if you're having a bad day reading that stuff is really hard. People for whatever reason think such comments are OK and I should just put up with it - and most of the time you do."

In an email that Bradford received once another woman had wrote that "she couldn't believe I was allowed on TV, that my voice is like nails on a chalkboard", Bradford revealed.

The Inside Word

The Inside Word host Jehan Casinader spoke with Jazz Thornton, Jayden Cromb and Katie Bradford about cyber bullying.

"You think, what makes you sit there and think that that is OK to send to someone.

"Another one called a colleague and I Dumb and Dumber - lots of comments about being stupid, I notice on Facebook. There are a lot of things accusing us  of not being smart - ironically a lot of the time they're not spelt correctly."

Bradford said that the comments differed depending on which social media platform was used. For example, comments on Twitter took a more political tone than the ones on Facebook.

"I have blocked so many people now because it can get so nasty sometimes," she said.

How the comments would affect her mental health depended on the state of her mind on a particular day.

"Sometimes you can laugh it off so when someone says "Dumb and Dumber" you go 'oh well let's go and get tee-shirts and have them printed with these words - that's fine',"

"But if it's a tough day - and I have experienced pretty tough times - and you get messages like these...,"

Bradford said she would love to speak to someone who assumes such comments are okay.

"I'd love to know what's going through their head or what is going on in their lives when they do that, and that would be  an interesting experiment."

Bradford said she gets through the negative effect of bullying by "reinforcing the positives" and "remembering what the real people think, the ones who are close to you and love you - what they think".

The latest episode also featured Jazz Thorton, founder of Voices of Hope, who tried to take her life 14 times as a teenager after being subjected to cyber-bullying and Jayden Cromb who's brother died as a result of being bullied by text messages. Following his brother's death, Cromb also tried to take his own life.

Previous episodes of The Inside Word had featured media host Hayley Holt, who spoke about her alcohol addiction and Mike King who opened up about his substance abuse.

The Inside Word airs Sundays, 9pm. 

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