The year that gummy viatimins broke the internet

For this blog to make sense, we need to go back to Coachella 2019, when one of the biggest scandals between two of the biggest beauty influencer happened between Tati Westbrook and James Charles.
James and Tati became close after Tati took James under her wing. She helped him with his brand as well as advice on how to become successful on youtube, helping him grow on the platform. Tati even flew in James to attend her wedding when he didn't have enough money to go. They both supported each other through every launch and collaboration.
A few years later, James attended Coachella, a music festival that many influencers attend. When James went, he bought VIP passes. Not realizing it was easy for a lot of people to get, which James didn't know until he was there.
He had asked one of his friends Nikita how she got a backstage pass, which is a more exclusive pass. She told him that a sponsor had given it to her and that she would talk to her connections to get him one.
Informing him that all he had to do to get the pass was post a video of him promoting Sugar Bear hair, and he would get backstage passes. But as soon as James posted the video, Tati posted a video in response to what James posted—expressing how hurt she felt by him as Tati also sells gummy vitamins by her own brand Halo Beauty.
After he posted the video promoting her biggest competitors, she proceeded to post a 40-minute video exposing him and portraying him as a predator. He was accused of going after straight men and trying to use his 'influence' to manipulate them.
Many people came forth telling their side of their story and how they too, were forced to have sexual relationships with James.
After news broke out, James started to lose followers, friends, and sponsors. Jeffree Star was one of the many people that accused him of being a predator, even going as far as calling him a danger to society. He played a significant roll on how people viewed him.
Jeffree stood by everything that Tati had accused James of and fueled the flame of this narrative.
During this time, all you would see was hate comments, death threats, and verbal attacks against anyone who was still associated with him.
He took a two-month hiatus off of all social media platforms because of the backlash. After his break, he expressed how much the hate got to him.
He was then interviewed to discuss the effects that social media had on him. James expressed how much social media has taken a toll on him and his mental health. After this incident, James gained a bad reputation, being recognized as a predator.
And because of how believable this was, straight men would purposely make James think that they were interested in him only to 'expose' him for clout.
James never stopped not receiving hate.
It wasn't until recently that more things were brought into the spotlight, revealing that James wasn't as guilty as people made him out to be.
Jeffree Star was a guest on a podcast; they talked about the incident that took place almost a year ago. It was revealed during the podcast that Jeffree and Tati were no longer friends and that there was no hate between the two.
After this was brought up Jeffree, proceeded to switch his story, now blaming Tati, making her responsible for James's downfall.
Which many people didn't agree with, as he was also the one that accused James of being a predator.
Both Tati and Jeffree played a part in James's downfall. And because of how quick cancel culture works, it was easy for people to hate regardless if there was evidence or not. I even believed this narrative because the majority of people accused James. But all this can be explained because we experience something in psychology known as Groupthink.
This is a psychological phenomenon that occurs within a group of people; it is the desire for conformity in the group resulting in an irrational decision-making outcome. It relates to this because people would rather stay quiet than to be associated with the minority opinion. Everyone else is scared of speaking up because the majority will attack anyone who disagrees with their perspective.
This happened to people who protected James during the scandal; they also got dragged into it, making it personal rather than what it actually was about.
I can't help but think that all of this could've been avoided if Tati would've just talked to James about how she felt. Yes, she told him he needed help, but i think like exposing him like this wasn't how she should've gone about it. The only reason why this came to light is that James' friend couldn't support someone how promoted their competition. And even if James being canceled was a bad thing at least, now he knows who his real friends are and who was just there because it benefited them.
It sucks that he had to be canceled for him to realize this.