Controversial journalist and TV host Piers Morgan loves to rile people up and share his divisive opinions on celebrities and politicians and their behavior. Apologies from the polarizing British personality are rare.
But he's just admitted that there's one critical comment he made about a star that he now regrets — and it was aimed at none other than Lady Gaga.
In a new interview with RadioTimes.com, Piers was asked if there was a particular tweet from his past that bothered him to the point that he wishes he could go back and say something different.
After giving it some thought, he replied, "I remember Lady Gaga saying she had PTSD and stuff and I launched into her and sort of inferred that no one outside the military should really be claiming to get PTSD," he explained, later admitting that he was "a little too all-encompassingly judgmental."
Back in December 2016, Piers got a lot of backlash from other PTSD sufferers and their families when he responded to a CNN story headlined "Lady Gaga: 'I suffer from PTSD'" with the retort, "No, soldiers returning from battlefields do. Enough of this vain-glorious nonsense."
He continued tweeting about it, writing, "I come from a big military family. It angers me when celebrities start claiming 'PTSD' about everything to promote themselves." At the time, he also was unsupportive of Gaga's claim that the PTSD was a result of a sexual assault and rape she suffered when she was 19. "Lady Gaga & Madonna have both made ALLEGATIONS of rape many years after the event. No police complaint, no charges, no court case," Piers wrote in December 2016.
Now, he admits he regrets his initial response.
"I don't think I should have been quite so dismissive of everybody," Piers told RadioTimes.com. "I've got a lot of military in my family and PTSD is obviously a real problem if you come off a battlefield but I do accept that you can have it in other forms."
In terms of "the mental health debate in the country," he added, "I think I've been perhaps a little insensitive. I would accept that."
He went on to tell RadioTimes.com that high suicide rates at UK universities and high levels of anxiety among young people are cause for concern. "Something's not right. It's just not right."
Piers then explored one aspect of what he thinks could be going on and admitted that his take might not be — big surprise — something everyone can agree with: "I'm slightly worried that we talk too much about it and actually put too much stuff into people's heads. It's not a popular view, but the more you talk about anything the more people tend to ask themselves, 'Am I suffering from this?' And sometimes they just need to get a grip of themselves…" he said. "I've got four kids and they all go through difficult periods of feeling anxious about stuff and we just have to have quite to the point conversations, and then they quickly move on."
He continued, "I think if I let them wallow too much in their own anxiety and spent the entire time talking about it, it's harder to come out of it, sometimes… I do think we need to think quite carefully about just how much we talk about this and what effect that might be having, just the general noise levels, in unfortunately increasing the levels of people who think they have got problems. When actually a lot of it is just life. Life's quite tricky."