YouTube beauty influencer James Charles has admitted he had inappropriate sexting conversations with two underage boys, and now people are asking why the brands he works with are not cancelling their business relationships.
Charles has denied accusations that he was grooming the younger men, saying that he had asked them their age before chatting to them, and he claims they both claimed to be eighteen. In a subsequent video post he has conceded that it was his responsibility to perform adequate checks before commencing the sexually changed exchange.
“These conversations should have never happened,” Charles said in the 14-minute video. Issuing a public apology to the two boys, Charles he would take time away from posting on social media to “educate” himself about these issues.
The YouTuber has a massive audience of 25 million subscribers to his channel, but has been rocked by controversy in the past. Back in 2019 he set a record for losing subscribers, when over 1 million people unsubscribed from his channel in a single day. The audience loss followed accusations that Charles targeted heterosexual men and tried to convince them to engage in sexual activity.
The controversy however was only a small blip in the makeup artist’s career, his audience has grown substantially over the last two years, his Youtube audience has risen from 16 million to 25 million, and he has 32 million followers on Tik Tok. In recent years he’s forged ahead striking new partnership deals with major brands.
YouTube have announced that Charles will no longer be the host of their online show Instant Influencer, they’ll be taking the show in a new direction for its second season and will engage a new host. The company did not give an explicit reason for dropping Charles, and he remains on their monetization program with his channel.
Business Insider has also approached many of the brands who’ve developed sponsorship deals with in the past, most have declined to comment on his recent troubles. Â
OIP Staff
Love OUTinPerth Campaign
Help support the publication of OUTinPerth by contributing to our
GoFundMe campaign.
