Hazbin Hotel and VivziePop Drama
Iâve been hearing/seeing a lot of drama concerning Hazbin Hotel and itâs creator VivziePop, and while I donât know her personally or really care what people think, I do hate slander and the spread of misinformation. Truly nothing in this world upsets me more than when people believe rumours while making no effort to fact check, and thatâs exactly whatâs happening right now. That said, I wanted to try and clear up some of the rumours going around about Vivzie and the show, because I think some of them are absolutely outrageous and need to be addressed.
1. Vivzie hired an abuser onto the show.
Now, Iâm not here to burn anyone at the stake, especially since I donât know anything about Chris Niosi (the alleged abuser), who I believe openly admitted to the allegations? Regardless, this is a moot point. Heâs not credited anywhere at the end of the episode. So either he was booted before production wrapped up or he had nothing to do with the show in the first place.
2. Vivzie supports bestiality.
Admittedly I thought this one might be true, since she draws so many anthropomorphic animals. In the very least, I figured she was probably a furry, but I havenât seen any evidence supporting this accusation either. Near as I can tell, this rumour started for two reasons. One, because of her famous Zoophobia comic, which revolves around a therapist named Cameron who gets assigned to work with human-like animals. Ironically, poor Cameron suffers from crippling zoophobia, which makes for some pretty decent comedy. I didnât read the whole comic because, quite frankly, itâs not my cup of tea and I just donât have the time. But from what I saw there are no examples of bestiality anywhere in its contents.
Two, this message, which blew up all over social media:
To me, this just proves that people are more interested in virtue signalling than checking to see if their claims are actually true. Everything about this message is 100% false, which Iâll touch on in my next point.
3. Vivzie is a pedophile and sheâs drawn child porn.
This is hands down the worst allegation and holy shit, I really wish people would stop using it to defame someone when they donât have any proof. This is a life-ruining accusation and youâre disgusting if you believe it based solely on hearsay. This rumour began to spread when Vivzie allegedly shipped the two underage characters in the above photo and drew them NSFW-style. At the time, one character was 19 while the other was 14, and the relationship was a very illegal student-teacher relationship.
This is WRONG! The characters were not 14 and 19, they were actually 18 and 19, the legal age of consent! Additionally, the relationship wasnât student-teacher. One character is a student and the other is Alumni (a student teacher). This one pisses me off the most because itâs obvious the person who sent that message didnât even bother to conduct any research. They said, âHeâs a teacher, sheâs a child.â Both characters are MALE!
Since then, Vivzie has apologised for any NSFW art she drew in the past and stated that itâs not a reflection of her art today, and Iâm inclined to believe her. Almost every artist has drawn NSFW content at some point in their career, and hers wasnât even distasteful. Other than this one example, there is no evidence anywhere that suggests sheâs drawn âchild pornâ. In fact, sheâs never even drawn explicit NSFW.
Please stop spreading this rumour. Itâs dangerous and completely incorrect.
4. Vivzie said the âNâ word!
No, she didnât. It was a fabricated tweet. That is all.
5. Vivzie is copyright striking every video that criticises her!
No she isnât. YouTubeâs DMCA is automatically striking people who are using full clips without permission. Vivzie has gone public several times, telling people exactly how to avoid getting a copy strike from the algorithm, which is something she absolutely does not have to do. At this point, she doesnât owe you anything. In my opinion, she should just sit back and watch these channels burn.
6. Vivzie copies and traces other artistsâ work.
This is another one Iâve seen going around, but I looked into it as thoroughly as I could and failed to find any concrete evidence to support the allegations. As of right now, there are only two examples of Vivzie âcopyingâ or âtracingâ other artistsâ work, and both of them can be explained. The first is a gif she made with a character from her Zoophobia comic, which looked a lot like the girl from ME!ME!ME!:
Damn, thatâs pretty incriminating. She obviously stoleâ oh, wait. This gif was part of a ME!ME!ME! MEP (multi editorâs project) and Vivzie didnât take full credit, despite the fact that itâs not even a direct trace. Itâs supposed to look like the original, which she fully cited. The second example comes from a short dance sequence from her Timber video, which seems to have been inspired by several Disney movies. As Vivzie herself stated, that was an homage to the original animations. Lots of artists and shows do this, including the beloved Stephen Universe series.
Regardless, this doesnât count as stealing character designs or plagiarising someoneâs work. Itâs meant to be respectful, an admiration of other projects. Other than these two instances, however, there is no evidence of her tracing or stealing other peopleâs art. From what Iâve discovered, all other designs sheâs been accused of âstealingâ are characters she bought and paid for. Theyâre quite literally HER characters.
7. Vivzie supports problematic creators.
Iâm getting really tired of guilt by association. Vivzie follows and enjoys some controversial figures, but who cares? We can argue all day about whether or not the accusations against them are true, but it ultimately has nothing to do with the show or Vivzie as a person. I do the exact same thing, to be honestâ follow and listen to people on all sides so I can learn, understand, and form my own opinions. The fact that some people think this is bad, to me, is absolutely mesmerising. Vivzie doesnât control what the people she follows post, and if they do something overly questionable she publicly criticises and denounces it.
Now that thatâs been dealt with, Iâd like to address some complaints/claims about the actual show.
8. Vaggie is an angry Latina stereotype and a lesbian stereotype. Vivzie is appropriating Hispanic culture and misrepresenting the gay for profit.
First off, I see a lot of people passing around yet more misinformation regarding Vivzieâs race. So many people seem to think sheâs white? Well, Iâm here to tell you theyâre wrong. Very incorrect. Vivzie is in fact Latina, and Vaggie is meant to mirror some of her own personality traits.
Second, who is Vaggie mad at? Context matters, and if we take a look at the episode, we see that Vaggie is literally only mad at two specific people: Angel Dust and Alastor. Why? Well, for starters, itâs her girlfriendâs dream to run a rehab hotel for sinners, and Angel Dust nearly demolishes that dream single-handedly. Vaggie has every right to be over-the-top vitriolic. Then thereâs Alastor, a known sadist, narcissist, and murderer who loves trapping people in his nefarious schemes. He invites himself in, effectively takes over the hotel, and pushes both her and Charlie aside. At one point he even sexually assaults her by slapping her butt during his musical number. So yeah, I think her seething ire is totally justified. Keep in mind, however, that when sheâs around Charlie sheâs calm, collected, and happy. I wouldnât call that a stereotype.
Thirdly, the lesbian stereotypes. I keep hearing this argument but I really donât see it. Both Vaggie and Charlie have so much personality and trust for each other. Maybe Iâm wrong, but the stereotype I know always totes a more butch, tomboyish woman with a ditsy, innocent, naive woman. Charlie is optimistic, but she isnât stupid. She refuses to shake Alastorâs hand because she knows heâs likely trying to screw her over. Sheâs also not entirely innocent herself and uses words like âfuckâ and âshitâ. I also wouldnât call Vaggie butch or tomboyish. She has a cute, girly presentation, complete with a pink ribbon in her hair, lace stockings, and a dress. Sheâs protective of her girlfriend, as I think we all are with our partners, and thereâs nothing wrong with that. Theyâre flawed characters, as every character is meant to be. This isnât a problem.
9. The show is racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, blah, blah, blah.
Iâm amazed this is even an argument. The show is supposed to be a dark comedy that takes place in HELL. You know, the place the worst of the worst end up after they die? What were you expecting? Everyone gets a shot or two fired at them, but that doesnât make them bad characters nor does it make the show itself horrible. Take, for example, Katie Killjoy, the news reporter so many people are up in arms about. She says she doesnât âtouch the gaysâ because she has âstandardsâ. Well, hereâs a newsflash of my own: weâre not supposed to like her! Sheâs an antagonist. Not to mention ten seconds later Charlie insults her and isnât the least bit slighted by her pretentious attitude. The characters are strong and donât take shit from anyone, because to some degree theyâre all terrible people who can throw down when itâs called for.
Obviously if you donât like the show or think itâs offensive, Iâm probably not going to change your mind. Thatâs perfectly fine. Youâre entitled to your opinions and you donât have to watch the show. Just stop lying and stop trying to take it away from everybody else. Stop attacking Vivzie and spreading misinformation without checking the facts. I realise a lot of people probably arenât trying to be vindictive and only want to do something good, but just remember this: the road to hell is paved with good intentions.