Sam Smith has responded to accusations of “ignorance” after reacting with shock at witnessing a friend be racially abused in London.

On Tuesday, the singer posted a series of tweets describing how he was left “speechless” by the incident and expressing his shock at the fact it happened in London, where Smith was born.

He faced a backlash soon after from some accusing the 23-year-old of “living in a bubble” for being surprised that racism could take place in the capital.

Others argued he didn't need to “whitesplain” racism because the incident was experienced by his friend, not him.

Smith has now addressed these criticisms in a message posted to his Instagram, which he asked his 6.5million followers to read.

Defending himself, he said he was simply sharing his experience “in the hope it would draw attention to how ridiculous it is to be racist in 2016”, a sentiment that echoes one of Smith’s original tweets where he said he wanted to “shine some sort of a light” on what happened to his friend.

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Smith also drew on his own experiences of homophobic bullying in the post, explaining: “I don’t profess to know or remotely understand what it means to be on the receiving end of racist abuse, but having been bullied my whole life for being gay, what I do know is that it is wrong and completely unacceptable.”

“Here’s to people being allowed to be people,” he ended the post.

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His initial series of tweets were met with a mixed reaction as some praised him for using his position to drawn attention to an important issue.