Outraged James Charles Fans Create Memes, Destroy YouTuber's Make-up Palettes

"James Charles is cancelled." Fans of the YouTuber have been destroying his formerly successful merchandise and spreading memes online after the influencer's recent controversy.

Charles' reputation in the community has been in a tailspin since his former friend and fellow YouTuber Tati Westbrook posted a 40-minute video exposing Charles' questionable behavior last week. Westbrook claimed that Charles has tried to trick straight men into sleeping with him, has let "the fame get to his head" and (worst of all) pushed a competitor's multivitamin. This whole scandal has shaken the internet stan culture to its core, with more than 2.2 million viewers unsubscribing from Charles' channel over the course of the weekend.

Since Westbrook's original video, Charles has attempted to lessen the damage by releasing his own apology video. In it, he expresses his regrets to Westbrook for acting like a fool, but the damage was already done. The video is currently the 13th most disliked video on all of YouTube, gathering more than 2.2 million dislikes in just a few short days. Charles is currently on his "Sister Tour," visiting venues around the world and made his Australian fans wait over an hour-and half before making it onto the stage. "Thanks for waiting, I had to sort some personal things things out this morning," Charles said to an audience of his most devoted fans.

Charles had enjoyed one of the most devoted fan bases of any YouTuber, at one point boasting more than 16 million followers, many of whom flocked to buy whatever merchandise he was hocking. His line of "Sister" apparel, consisting of glittery sweatshirts and T-shirts with the content creators slogan, sold out seconds after they went for sale online. Partnering with make-up brand Morphe, Charles created a line of make-up accessories, including a pallette, which also quickly sold out in Ulta stores around the world.

In the wake of this drama, former fans are discarding, burning or destroying their James Charles' make-up palettes.

Make-up palettes are also being returned to the stores in which they were purchased. One Twitter user claimed that 26 of them were returned to her local Ulta store.

There has never been anything quite like the Charles drama of 2019. He's lost more subscribers than any other content creator in the shortest amount of time, a feat that will go down in the internet culture history books. Though fans often feel personally attached to content creators, it's commonly a one-sided friendship with a carefully managed online persona, which makes the controversy all the more upsetting. Millions of teenage girls just found out that the goofy teenager that's been making make-up tutorials might not be a very nice guy.

Will the controversy subside, and can Charles recover? Only time can tell.

Outraged James Charles Fans Create Memes, Destroy YouTuber's Make-up Palettes | Culture