Online taunts stop Goldberg’s tweets

Whoopi Goldberg has more than 413,000 followers on Twitter, but she hasn’t used Twitter since New Year’s Eve because she got fed up with a few people calling her nasty words and wishing she would die.

“I just can’t be dealing with people and their anger at every little thing. It’s like, ‘Back off.’ Everybody gets to have an opinion, which is OK,” Goldberg says.

“It just got so ugly and personal from people I will never meet,” she says.

Goldberg — who performs Friday at Treasure Island — insinuates that anonymous haters on Twitter are cowards.

“Don’t say anything to me on Twitter that you wouldn’t say to my face. Don’t say nasty stuff to me that, if you met me, you wouldn’t have the cojones to say to me.”

To put this in perspective, if you search for Goldberg’s name on Twitter, it looks as if 95 percent of people who mention her love her. It’s the 5 percent that chased her off Twitter. And here’s her message to them:

“I don’t care how old you are, how hip you are, or who you think you are, don’t write me with your (expletive), I’m not interested.”

Goldberg has been a lightning rod for haters for years, at times having been called bad names associated with being black, a woman and a liberal.

So my question: From her own standpoint, why does she think some people attack her? Because she’s black, because she’s a woman, or because she’s perceived as an iconic liberal?

“All of it,” Goldberg, 57, says.

She vows to return to Twitter at some point to stay connected to people.

In the meantime, she’s still riling people up on “The View,” where she is avoiding thinking about Joy Behar’s announcement she will leave the show when her contract ends in August.

“I love Joy. I’m not even dealing with it. This is not my show. As long as my check doesn’t bounce, I will be there,” Goldberg says.

She is also promoting a documentary she directed and produced, “I Got Somethin’ to Tell You,” a film about pioneering comedian Moms Mabley.

It was a challenge finding personal footage of Mabley because the media didn’t often chronicle the private lives of black performers back in the 1930s through the 1970s, she says.

“We know everything about Charlie Chaplin. We know very little about Moms or any of those performers of color who worked the black people circuit,” she says.

Goldberg’s wish is to partner with PBS and Ken Burns on documentaries about the history of black performers — or even that another documentarian would finance their own such films.

“No one’s done it” yet, she says. “There are some documentaries on black comedy, but nothing on drama, and nothing on music, and nothing on dance.”

By the way, Goldberg may be perceived as ultra-political, but she has no thoughts for us today on which candidates she’s rooting for in 2016.

“I’m just gonna sit out the next four years, and I’ll think about it,” she says.

SIGHTINGS: Comedian and actor Bob Saget was feeling bubbly on Saturday. He ordered a magnum of Perrier-Jouet Rose Champagne to drink with friends at Bellagio’s lounge Lily. ...

Ice-T ate with wife Coco (the “Peepshow” headliner) Saturday at Sammy Hagar’s Cabo Wabo Cantina. She drank frozen Vida Locas, whatever that is. And Mr. Ice-T’s drink: frozen strawberry daiquiri.

Yes Ice-T likes frozen strawberry daiquiris, don’t judge the T.

Doug Elfman’s column appears Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. He also writes for Neon on Fridays. Email him at delfman@reviewjournal.com. He blogs at reviewjournal.com/elfman.