Steps star Ian “H” Watkins has responded after thousands of fans found that they had been blocked by him on Twitter.
For the past few days, many have been tweeting their bewilderment on realising that the singer appeared to have blocked them.
Some who were blocked said they didn’t even know who Watkins was. One person tweeted: “I too have been blocked by H from Steps. And I have no idea who H is or who Steps are.”
The move led to the hashtag “BlockedByHFromSteps” trending on Twitter, with Watkins eventually explaining in a since-deleted post: “I recently signed up for a clean-up of ‘bots’ and ‘phobes’. Apologies if the blocking offended… I didn’t do this manually! Merry Christmas.”
On Wednesday (28 December), the star shared an old photo of himself behind a desk and laptop, with the caption: “Very busy day at the office… #blocked.”
He had also shared a meme of pictures of Oprah Winfrey with the words: “You get a block! You get a block! Everybody gets a block!”
The singer became famous in the Nineties with the British pop band Steps, alongside Lee Latchford-Evans, Claire Richards, Lisa Scott-Lee and Faye Tozer. Their hits included “Tragedy” and “5, 6, 7, 8”.
In 2020, Watkins competed in the 12th season of the ITV series Dancing on Ice. He was the first celebrity in the history of the show to compete within a same-sex couple, with professional partner Matt Evers.
