After years of hard work, PewDiePie became the first individual Youtuber to break through the 100 million subscriber mark late in August. His channel is by far the biggest on the platform for a solo content creator, garnering millions of views on every video.
Felix "PewDiePie" Kjellberg announced in a video on Tuesday that he would be donating $50,000 to the Anti-Defamation League in an attempt to make amends and "move on" after a shooter in Christchurch, New Zealand, said "Subscribe to PewDiePie" before carrying out his attack last spring. "As an additional celebration, I will be donating $50,000 to the Anti Defamation League, which is an organization that fights bigotry and prejudice in all its forms," he said.
"Making a donation to the ADL doesn't make sense to everyone, especially since they've outright spoken against me," Kjellberg said in a statement posted to Twitter. "I think it's important, this just isn't my fight anymore." Kjellberg's decision to donate the money became a conspiracy among some commenters after his announcement on Tuesday. Anti-Semitic comments suggested that he was blackmailed by the ADL — a Jewish anti-hate group — in order to be in good standing again on YouTube and in the media. On Wednesday, Kjellberg posted a statement on Twitter in light of the conspiracies, saying he's making the donation to "move past" his controversies.
Kjellberg has oftentimes been steeped in controversy for using racist language or anti-Semitic imagery in his videos. After paying two men on Fiverr to hold up a sign that said "death to all Jews" in 2017, Disney severed ties with him. ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt congratulated Disney for its move soon after the decision was made. Because of his history with the organization, fans were surprised at his decision, which has pushed for stricter quarantine of hate speech on online platforms, going after major content creators like the Swede.
Reddit user 'unpopularxopinions' said "I don't like that PewDiePie is funding the ADL's bullshit," while 'shortcutone' argued "there are way better organizations to be donating to for this issue." Another said "the fact of the matter is that the ADL is notorious for censorship and they unfairly slandered PewDiePie and done that to numerous groups/people. The fact that he donated $50k to them is disrespectful to all of the people they've attacked."
Comments about the donation have been removed from the video after some fans criticized the decision. PewDiePie's editor asked fans to "stop", calling the complaints a conspiracy theory, instead of just congratulating him on reaching 100 million subs.
More at the two articles linked above. A lot of anti-semetic rhetoric has risen from this suggesting he was blackmailed by the ADL. Seems a lot of people have issue with the organization he chose to donate to, though personally I don't think it's as deep as they're making it out to be with all the conspiracies and what not.
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