A Swedish Instagram influencer has deleted her account after a bikini photo from her travels in Bali sparked an angry backlash. Natalie Schlater, from Stockholm, posed in a white bikini overlooking a rice field under gloomy skies on the Indonesian island.
Instagram users slammed the model over her caption, which read: 'Thinking about how different my life is from the man picking in the rice field every morning.' Many of her 12,000 followers called the post 'insensitive', 'narcissistic', and a 'humble brag'. One follower wrote: 'The rice farmer is probably more content with their life though and not the status chasing like the rest of us.'
Before deleting her account, Schlater tried to defend herself, claiming she had been 'misunderstood'. She wrote: 'I am very aware of my privileges and how grateful I am for all that I have in my life and I was recognising how hardworking and unbelievably kind the Indonesian people are and never meant to come off disrespectful.'
She told the website Bored Panda that the backlash had left her 'heartbroken', and she wishes she could go back in time and write a different caption. She added: 'It breaks my heart to see this photo turned into a different light than it was originally meant to be. I have always loved the Indonesian people and their culture.'
Schlater also claimed she does not come from wealth, saying: 'I worked extremely hard to save up enough money to go on that trip as I do not come from wealth as it may look like from social media.'
