By Carolina Pedrajas Botella
After weeks of allegations that he sexted and sexually groomed underage boys, YouTuber James Charles posted a video early this month called Holding Myself Accountable.
In this video, Charles addresses the claims and apologises for his behaviour. He said that he was unaware that some of the boys were underage, and that he himself should have verified their age before sexting. “I was being reckless … these conversations should have never have happened,” he said.
Despite the apology, YouTube took a step forward and decided to demonetise him temporarily, meaning that they have removed him temporarily from the YouTube partners programme. YouTube confirmed the news to the BBC.
A YouTube spokesperson said the company had applied their creator responsibility policy, which says: “If we see that a creator’s on- and/or off-platform behaviour harms our users, community, employees or ecosystem, we may take action to protect the community.”
Morphe, a makeup company that collaborates with the influencer for a long time, also decided to end their partnership with Charles, which they announced on Twitter on April 17th.
Later that day, the influencer tweeted in to respond to Morphe’s announcement. “I’ve loved every moment of working together, and am beyond grateful for what we’ve created together,” he shared.
The internet has been buzzing with this news.
“I think that it’s funny to make those kind of decisions for a boy who is only 21 years old,” said Nikita Simonaviciute, 20, a student from Lithuania.
“Girls these days in their teens are sending provocative pictures to a 30 year old or more, and they are blackmailing them, but somehow they doesn’t get cancelled.”
On the other hand, Lia Arnold, 24, a student from Germany, says that he deserves to be demonetised from YouTube “When you flirt with someone, you have to make sure that he/she is over age, especially when you are in the public eye,” she says.
“Something like this can ruin your life.”
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