Report: PewDiePie YouTube Series Cancelled Due to Anti-Semitic Posts

[Steven Bogos]

Report: PewDiePie YouTube Series Cancelled Due to Anti-Semitic Posts

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Disney has reportedly cancelled the second season of PewDiePie's YouTube reality show: Scare PewDiePie, over some anti-Semitic posts.

Popular YouTube personality Felix "Pewdiepie" Kjellberg has just had the rug pulled from under him regarding his YouTube realtiy show: Scare PewDiePie. Both Google [http://variety.com/2017/digital/news/disney-pewdiepie-anti-semitic-videos-1201987380/] have announced that they are severing ties with the star, and although an official reason has not been given, the timing suggests it was due to some anti-semitic stunts that Kjellberg has been pulling.

"We've decided to cancel the release of Scare PewDiePie Season 2 and we're removing the PewDiePie channel from Google Preferred," a YouTube spokesperson said.

Nine of PewDiePie's videos are alleged to contain anti-Semitic imagery, including one recent video that featured the YouTube star commissioning two comedians to make a "Death to all Jews" banner, which you can see in the image above.

Scare PewDiePie was a collaboration between Disney's Maker Studios and The Walking Dead parent company Skybound Entertainment. As the title may suggest, Kjellberg was exposed to a number of frightening, video game-inspired scenarios intended to scare him.

Source: Variety [http://variety.com/2017/digital/news/youtube-cancels-pewdiepie-pulls-ads-death-to-jews-1201987810/]

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[TelosSupreme]

To me, this is just the mainstream media and corporate world continuing to not understand how the Internet works. What did Disney really expect when they partnered with PewDiePie in the first place?

Frankly, this also further proves to me how much better the Internet was back when social media and media influence weren't a part of it. It was a wild west where anyone could speak their mind, share with and debate opinions, and have a good laugh. Now everybody takes themselves way too seriously.

 

[American Tanker]

Now everybody takes themselves way too seriously.

But don't you know? The Internet is SRS BSNS.

/joke

God damn, I miss the days before social media.

 

[Zontar]

How hard where they dropped on their head as a child to not understand that it was a joke that at worst one could say it stupid?

I'm offended that they took this so seriously that they dropped him over it because of nonexistent antisemitism.

 

[CaitSeith]

What did Disney really expect when they partnered with PewDiePie in the first place?

Nothing anti-semitic it seems.

 

[Saltyk]

How hard where they dropped on their head as a child to not understand that it was a joke that at worst one could say it stupid?

I'm offended that they took this so seriously that they dropped him over it because of nonexistent antisemitism.

To be fair, it's totally within their right to no longer work with him.

All the same, while I know next to nothing of him, I highly doubt Pewdiepie actually an antisemite. They were likely jokes made in (arguably) poor taste.

Oh, but perhaps we should go ahead and punch him to be safe?

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

He went full Mel Gibson. Never go full Mel Gibson.

 

[Zulnam]

You'd expect Disney to stick to their tradition and promote stuff like this.

See, i can make anti-semitism accusations too.

It's double funny if you follow the geopolitical scene involving Israel.

 

[ObsidianJones_v1legacy]

I never watched PewdiePie. He and youtubers like him never struck me as funny. So I really can't speak for his content. I do generally believe people when they say his jokes were taken out of context, because I vaguely remember him calling for people to get along over some deal. Again, don't watch him, don't know.

What I do know for fact is that he signed contracts. With Disney. One of the most homogenized, white bread, Pollyanna (Pun!) companies this world will have ever seen.

If I am hired with Company X that says I can not use my position or link myself to the company when I speak my beliefs outside of working hours, and my Facebook has that I work as CEO for Company X... and I decide to go an a Diatribe on Hillary/Trump, saying supporters of either are the subhuman garbage that is bringing this country down.

Or, nothing that big, what if I take to twitter and post of picture of me naked with Trump's face instead of my penis with the caption "See, baby, I told you I had the biggest dick in America in my pants"? If Company X fires me, are you all going to come to my side and yell "CENSORSHIP!!"?

Or are you going to call me a dumb ass that deserves it and then tell me to next time read my contracts and abide by the company's morals so I don't get fired again?

 

[Deathfish15]

Company reflected PR. When the guy looks like an antisemitic as a Disney employee, then too does Disney look antisemitic.

There's got to be some undertone antisemitic feeling from PewDiePie if he's going to make those kind of jokes without emotional sympathy or understanding. Especially when this is a REPEAT ISSUE on his channel over other past videos. This means that the feeling of antisemitism is there in his blood.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

Yeah, just his shitty YouTube red series. His channel is still up, he's still the #1 YouTube Channel, he still makes millions in ad revenue, he still is the King of YouTube and less than 6 months Google and YouTube will be begging, on their knees, mouth open, to have him back.
I don't like the dude, but he commands YouTube.

 

[Neurotic Void Melody]

This is a bit weak on info and slightly off. First, it was an investigation by the wall Street journal that was presented to Disney. Second, those two aren't hired comedians, they were paid through freelance marketplace Fiverr to just make the sign. And third, this guy has gained positive attention from the website The Daily Stormer who claim various things about Felix and them...Which, to put lightly; is not an accepting place for most of the humans on our planet. (Am hazarding a guess that might be the main dealbreaker for the companies...If concerned parents find their kids are visiting such sites through PewDiePie association, they could get into a bit of bad PR or worse one would imagine).

Whether it's just nazism Disney is touchy about, I dunno. But those jokes are so 90s and dumb, I'm kinda surprised people still think they're funny at this point. Just dull and predictable. Unless you're 5 years old.

 

[RedDeadFred]

I find it pretty funny that people think the companies have some moral obligation to take a joke despite it potentially damaging their bottom line. OBVIOUSLY they know it's a joke. That doesn't matter. It's not about what the companies know, it's about what their consumers believe. Do you think a bunch of parents who are oblivious to internet culture are brushing it off? No, they were probably screeching about never taking little Johnny to Disney World ever again.

Do people seriously think this was some reactionary decision because poor little indie company, Disney, got their precious feelings hurt?

Gotta love how everyone think they're a CEO and obviously KNOWS better than the huge company with tons of advisers that makes billions of dollars.

At least I got a chuckle out of it.

 

[Vanilla ISIS]

He went full Mel Gibson. Never go full Mel Gibson.

More like, he went full Walt Disney

 

[gorfias]

He went full Mel Gibson. Never go full Mel Gibson.

Dang they need thumbs up/likes in these threads like facebook.

 

[pookie101]

i honestly had not heard of him before yesterday but the suspicious part of me wonders if he did it on purpose for publicity and more people clicking on his videos

 

[klaynexas3]

I don't think anyone is faulting Disney for pulling backing, but at the same time, he's a man that came to fame shouting profanities at a camera playing video games. Even if his audience is a younger audience, his humor is, by media standards, adult (despite still being heavily immature). I haven't seen the videos, but the only one that I know about is the one with the death to jews thing. Which, yes it's anti-semitic, but it's so casual I don't know if I'd say he is anti-semitic himself, he just has very distasteful humor. It doesn't belong with the star you'd see currently with Disney channel, that's more something a Disney star would do after their fame has faded, so it makes sense to cut ties, which still begs the question as to why they thought he wouldn't do something like this, when his humor has always been a bit distasteful. It's like trying to work with the people that make South Park, which does have a heavy following of kids watching, it's just not appropriate for Disney to associate with it.

At the end of the day, it's not like this will touch him. He already has enough that he could live a comfortable single middle class life for the rest of his life living off the interest his bank account would generate alone, and that's if he quit everything. I doubt he will, so he'll be even more fine.

 

[Avnger]

I don't think anyone is faulting Disney for pulling backing,

*cough*

How hard where they dropped on their head as a child to not understand that it was a joke that at worst one could say it stupid?

I'm offended that they took this so seriously that they dropped him over it because of nonexistent antisemitism.

At the end of the day, it's not like this will touch him. He already has enough that he could live a comfortable single middle class life for the rest of his life living off the interest his bank account would generate alone, and that's if he quit everything. I doubt he will, so he'll be even more fine.

Without a doubt, he'll be fine. Maybe it'll be a nice smack on the side of the head that reminds him that, despite being the king of Youtube, there are still societal "behavior rules" for everyone.

 

[Vigormortis]

Unless you're 5 years old.

Basically describes almost the entirety of PewDiePie's fanbase.

I find it pretty funny that people think the companies have some moral obligation to take a joke despite it potentially damaging their bottom line. OBVIOUSLY they know it's a joke. That doesn't matter. It's not about what the companies know, it's about what their consumers believe. Do you think a bunch of parents who are oblivious to internet culture are brushing it off? No, they were probably screeching about never taking little Johnny to Disney World ever again.

Do people seriously think this was some reactionary decision because poor little indie company, Disney, got their precious feelings hurt?

Gotta love how everyone think they're a CEO and obviously KNOWS better than the huge company with tons of advisers that makes billions of dollars.

At least I got a chuckle out of it.

That and apparently some jackass YouTuber, after making a distasteful and extraordinarily offensive joke, is just exercising his rights to free speech, but a company of people are practicing 'CENSORSHIP!!1!' when they dare to disassociate themselves with said YouTuber for making that joke.

Hypocrisy at its finest.

 

[Xan Krieger]

It's funny when a company founded by an anti-semite gets upset because someone else makes a joke. If they hate anti-semites that bad they should scrub their history of Walt Disney.