Internet Beef & Cancel Culture

This year has been full of drama, including serious allegations made against your favorite youtubers, or petty drama resulting from internet beef. Since 2019 is almost over, I thought we would take a walk down memory lane and check back on a few of the biggest scandals this year, and decide whether or not the controversy is justified in cancelling the person, or if it's just petty drama. After I discuss the situation, I'm going to decide whether it was "PETTY" or "DESERVED".

James Charles v.s. Tati Westbrook - May 2019

Starting off with perhaps the biggest scandal of the year, the drama between former best friends, James and Tati. After James posted an Instagram story promoting a brand that is a competitor for Tati's brand, she took to her Instagram to call him out for betraying her brand and her as a person. After this, she posted the now deleted video, "Bye, Sister". This video is where Tati exposed him and even made accusations towards him, saying that he was a manipulator, liar, and a predator towards straight men. The reason why I trusted James Charles more in this situation is because in his response video he cleared up all of the allegations with evidence to back him up, which Tati did not have. What makes this situation petty is, Jeffree Star decided to insert himself in the situation, sending threatening texts to James and his 16 year old brother. If what Tati said was true, and if she really believed that he was a "danger to society", why did she wait until he betrayed her brand to call him out for criminal activity? If he was really the person she said he was, why didn't she end the friendship by herself, or contacted the police? In my opinion, I believe that no one was right in this situation. James could have been the predator he was made out to be, but he could also not have been. None of the pieces line up in the end for a definite answer, but this situation left James with 3 million less subscribers, and Tati's social blade green.

VERDICT: PETTY

The Ace Family & Their Multiple Scandals - 2018 to Present

The ACE family is the current biggest family vlogging channel out there right now. Vlogging your little children every day for their entire childhood is a problem within itself, but the ACE family adds different scandals to their lives everyday. Let's start at the beginning. Austin and Catherine had announced in late 2018 that they were going to host a charity basketball event, alongside their favorite famous friends. They had promised to donate $100 K towards a charity in Africa, but when the camera zoomed in towards the cheque, you could see they were only donating $75 K. I'm not saying that donating $75 K is nothing, it's a lot of money. But I always wondered where did that $25 K go? The answer is, they took it for themselves. Austin and Catherine are very egotistical people, with a lot of money and a little amount of care. They don't care about their fans as they continue to scam them for their money for personal gain. It's even more bizarre to me that they use their little daughters for money! They are literally selling merch with their daughter, Elle's face on it. The second scandal is the lollipop incident. Austin posted a video on his snapchat of him buying an inappropriate lollipop for his wife's little sister. In the video he's laughing about it, and even tries to justify it. There's a common theme in all of their scandals, they don't apologize. Lastly, the most serious one, the sexual assault case. Cole Carrigan, accused Austin of sexually assaulting his 2 friends, alongside his friends, body guards, and even his DAD! The worst thing about this situation is, that Cole had the evidence to back up his statement, and Austin even threatened to sue him, but never pulled through with it in the end. In my opinion, I used to watch the Ace Family a couple years ago when the money didn't get to their head. But now they have become manipulating towards their young audience, and portray this fake ideal family life, even though Austin continuously cheats on Catherine. Their entire careers are toxic towards their 2 daughters, and I feel that their cancellation is deserved.

VERDICT: DESERVED

Jaclyn Hill's Lipsticks - May 2019

Jaclyn Hill had announced in early 2019, that she would finally launch her own cosmetics brand. Her first product to launch were a line of nude lipsticks. When people received their order they found metal, glass shards, and hair in their lipsticks. This posed a health and safety danger towards her customers, as their lips were being burned and ripped open. Instead of apologizing for her mistake, and providing refunds, she did the exact opposite. She tried to justify the reason behind the hair and metals in the product, and her team did not give refunds to customers. This is NOT petty drama because it was a real safety concern that could have hurt people even more than it did. The situation was made worse because Jaclyn did not own up to her mistake. Recently she did launch her new highlighters, which were overall well received by the public, so I guess she can redeem herself. Other than that, I don't think this situation should be brushed under the carpet because it was a safety matter.

VERDICT: DESERVED

Olivia Jade's Bribery for College - March 2019

Olivia Jade is the rich and privileged daughter of Full House actress, Lori Loughlin and fashion designer, Mossimo Giannuli. In March, her parents were exposed for bribing a college with $500 K to make sure their daughters would get a place there. This is obviously very illegal, and wrong for many reasons. Despite everything that's wrong with this situation, it's the way she and her parents reacted and adressed the issue. At first they were silent, but a couple of weeks later, Olivia posted a picture of her on Instagram, flipping of the camera, and tagging all of the news outlets that reported on the scandal. Instead of taking responsibility for what she did, her and her privilege decided to play the victim card and not apologize. What's even worse is, her parents pleaded NOT GUILTY. This was an illegal situation, and was taken to court. And very recently, Olivia posted again to her YouTube channel, like nothing happened. If you take the spot of someone who actually deserved it, in college, and don't apologize, you're cancelled, next.

VERDICT: DESERVED

Emma Chamberlain and Hygiene - February 2019

Emma Chamberlain was known for being "not like other girls", which alone is a stupid statement, because it doesn't make you better than other girls. Anyways, she made a couple of jokes about not showering and received a huge amount of backlash. Personally, I don't find her funny, I think her humor comes from Twitter, and she's not original. But, what I can say is, I thought her showering jokes were gross and unfunny, but I didn't think she deserved to get cancelled for it. When you think about it, Shane Dawson has been making hygiene jokes for years, and everyone thought it was funny. He wears the same shirt, that has stains and is ripped, and no one bats an eye. But when Emma makes a joke about it, it's a problem. Another thing is, her collaboration with Louis Vuitton. Many people were upset that the brand chose her as their ambassador, because she has no "taste in fashion". People argued that they should've chose someone with real taste, and suggested a number of smaller youtubers. This is pretty dumb considering, that they would obviously choose someone who was popular, which she is. Also, why would she not take the opportunity? Yeah, I also agree that she doesn't have the best taste in clothes, but they need a popular face in order to get more attraction. This situation is nothing but petty, and Emma did not deserve the hate.

VERDICT: PETTY

In conclusion, this year has been full of scandals. I hope that next year has more petty drama, for entertainment purposes and less serious issues. What was your favourite scandal this year? Let me know!

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see ya next week !! :)

Art by Munya Haddara (@artbymunya)