Why Kelly Ripa enjoys clapping back on Instagram

If you’re familiar with Kelly Ripa, you’re likely aware that she likes to clap back at trolls on Instagram with quippy comments.

The “Live! With Kelly and Ryan” host is frequently featured on @CommentsByCelebs, which likes to highlight such interactions. For Ripa, it’s all about finding humor in the dark sides of social media.

“Sometimes if it’s really funny,” Ripa told In The Know about when she chooses to engage with negative comments. “Like, if I can come up with a quip that’s super funny, I will utilize it. I always try to check. I try to do a deep dive into their social media to make sure that we’re not dealing with somebody that’s unhinged in any way or maybe just having a bad go of it.”

View this post on Instagram

Nice work, you two. #CommentsByCelebs

A post shared by Comments By Celebs (@commentsbycelebs) on

“I try to use the force for good not just evil,” she added.

The one kind of comment she can’t really resist responding to? When users criticize her while also making unforgivable spelling errors.

“If somebody is judging me and then they can’t spell basic words, then they just get a clap back for being dumb,” Ripa laughed.

View this post on Instagram

Oh Kelly, you make us so proud. #CommentsByCelebs

A post shared by Comments By Celebs (@commentsbycelebs) on

The television personality, who ITK interviewed in support of her partnership with Persona Nutrition, jokingly told us that her daughter, Lola, who often accuses Ripa of embarrassing her on social media, is her “favorite troll” of all, saying that she finds her “endlessly entertaining.”

For Ripa, having her children to interact with and post about on Instagram represents a continuation of what the TV vet established on “Live,” which was an intimate relationship between her own family and her television family: Her audience has been there all along as she has raised Michael, Lola and Joaquin with husband Mark Consuelos, as she’s chronicled her parenthood journey on and off her show.

“It’s been such a privilege to be able to raise my kids in [this] way — and when they were little, they didn’t understand it. They understand it now,” Ripa told ITK. “People will walk up to them and say, ‘I feel like I’ve watched you grow up.’ And they appreciate that now, knowing that they’ve had an entire nation behind them since birth rooting for them — rooting for them since birth.”

“Their family is very large, and a lot of their family they’ve never met, and will never meet, and don’t know,” she added. “But they know that they’ve got people that root for them and have always rooted for them.”

That being said, Ripa revealed that there was a time when “there was a lockdown” on posting or talking about her children, as they yearned for privacy during some of their formative years.

“When they were tweens and teens, it was hard when there were lockdown periods where I was not allowed to mention them at all — at all!” Ripa said. “I mean, […] I could not mention aspects of their life, certain things were off limits completely.”

As you could probably tell from Ripa’s open book mentality when it comes to her family, those “lockdown periods” are no longer in effect.

“Now that they are young adults, they’re way cooler about it. They all find it very funny. They find social media funny. They realize that part of what I do in talking about them has aided their life, and their ability to go to college, and stuff like that,” Ripa explained. “Like, my son is in the workforce — right? — and he’s about to graduate, and he’s fully cognizant that a lot of what was possible to him was possible because I did have the ability to discuss him on TV.”

For more of Kelly Ripa’s thoughts on social media — including which celebrity she thinks is the “queen” of Instagram — watch the video above.

More to read:

This is the bag you’ll see every Gen Z-er sporting for spring

Kendall Jenner wore a white boiler suit and now we want one

Spanx faux leather leggings are going viral for a reason

Listen to the latest episode of our pop culture podcast, We Should Talk: