Warning: This post contains spoilers for Love Is Blind season 4.
While Kwame Appiah was excited to find The One on Love Is Blind season 4, his messy love triangle with Chelsea Griffin and Micah Lussier sparked backlash from critical viewers.
“Waking up to some really nasty messages, so I’ll share 1 with you all,” Kwame, 33, captioned a Saturday, March 25, Instagram video, revealing he was called the N-word by a social media user. “You’re all entitled to your opinion, and reflection on the show. But, waking up to multiple messages like this, is NOT OK. Things like this are inhumane, and we’ve gotta do better.”
He added: “You are getting to watch a sliver of my life and judge me. Based off the purely disgusting and hateful words I’m seeing, it could be an issue with me, but it’s also definitely an issue with you.”
The Ghana native — who noted his intention to take a social media hiatus following the online hate — is one of the Love Is Blind participants on season 4, which dropped the first five episodes on Friday, March 24. Kwame quickly sparked pod connections with both Chelsea, 31, and Micah, 27.
While the sales development manager was ready to propose to the marketing manager, she eventually — albeit quickly — broke things off in order to pursue her romance with Paul Peden, who popped the question on proposal day. Kwame, for his part, went back to Chelsea after realizing she had been steadfast in her support, and they got engaged as well.
While the former soccer player and Chelsea began exploring their steamy physical connection after meeting in person, Micah seemingly felt sad about shutting down their bond.
“I, like, love [Paul] so much but I had such a hard time equating [his voice and face], but with you, I feel like it fits like a little glove,” she confessed to Kwame during the cast trip to Mexico in the fourth episode. “I really do care about you as a person and the connection we made. I still, like, think about you [and] I hope the best for you. I just want you to be happy.”
Chelsea, however, was not pleased to see her fiancé and Micah continually chatting for long periods of time — while Kwame caressed the former realtor’s hand. After watching the two exes speak, several social media users vocalized their dislike for his actions.
“Opinions on me that’s OK, but there are definitely levels that shouldn’t be breached,” Kwame explained in his Saturday upload. “That’s when opinions that you have go to deeper levels of hate, racism and bigotry. I think that just crosses a line that shouldn’t be and it’s disgusting that people think it is OK to do this and hide behind the agenda of just ‘caring about a TV show.’ Like, I’m human, I make mistakes just like you make mistakes.”
Kwame was quickly supported by several of his pod buddies, including Zack Goytowski.
“Please send some love to the men and women of color on our show. You never know what someone is going through,” the 31-year-old criminal defense attorney — who was briefly engaged to Irina Solomonova — wrote via Instagram Story on Saturday, resharing Kwame’s initial post. “There are people out there who will use anything as a pretext to spread hate. But really they just have an issue with mixed [race] couples. [Kwame] is an amazing man: Humble, accomplished and he has a huge .”
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The first five episodes of Love Is Blind are currently streaming. New episodes drop on Fridays.