You have probably already informed yourself, but here is a masterlist anyway.
MAJOR CONTENT WARNINGS: BLACKFACE, SLURS, RACIST COMMENTS, CHILD PREDATORY COMMENTS, NSFW CONTENT, BEASTIALITY, TRANSPHOBIA, MISHANDLING OF MENTAL HEALTH ISSUES, OUTING AND MORE! PLEASE PROCEED WITH CAUTION.
Shane Dawson has been shown to mock black people on several occasions, saying the n word, doing blackface and creating stereotypical recurring characters.
When beginning on YouTube, Shane had a character called âShanaynayâ who was supposed to be a âghetto-white girlâ. When playing her, Shane often used ghetto stereotypes. She was a recurring character from 2008-2011. Although he has long stopped playing this character, he was continuing to sell the merch and profit off his racism as recently as last year!
He has also done blackface in his character skits, and said the n word as Shanaynay. On one of these occasions, he called an actual black woman a ân*gga bitch monkey womanâ. Watch the full video for all occasions.
Here are some additional comments on this matter.
-
Shane Dawson has acted inappropriately with and around minors for a long time.
He has probably done this even more than his blackface, and thatâs saying something.
This clip, which went around last year, contains him calling a 6-year-old child sexy and admitting to googling CP. This is from his Shane and Friends podcast, which contains a lot of explicit clips.
He has also asked his teenage fan to âshow herselfâ and âshut up and twerkâ. This is from 3:55 - 4:29 in this video.
One of the instances really going around on Twitter at the moment is him pretending to jerk off to a picture of the then-11 year old Willow Smith.
A reminder that her family has not forgiven him, so neither should you!
Honestly, there are way too many occasions of this. Please check out this Twitter thread which lists a lot of times he has made inappropriate comments and did inappropriate things.
Another very distasteful thing he has done is claim to solve the murder of an actual six-year-old child, profiting off âspeakingâ to her spirit.
-
Shane Dawson has joked about bestiality on camera multiple times.
This is just straight-up weird. It went around a lot last year, but in case youâve forgotten, here is a playlist of a few clips. He also rubbed his face in his dogâs crotch but I canât find a direct video of that by itself.
-
Shane Dawson is transphobic as hell.
Watch this full video for the details where he uses trans as an insult and says tr*nny while knowing it is a derogatory term.
-
Shane Dawson has promoted and supported terrible people and channels.
This has been a long-time criticism of his viral documentary series, but it is still important to remember.
Letâs start with the problems with this in chronological order.Â
His first viral documentary series was The Truth about Tanacon.
Tanacon, to begin with, had several issues. Despite big dreams, it failed spectacularly due to lack of organisation and preparation before the event. There were many last minute changes and it generally lacked several necessities in events. Some issues were disorganised registrations, reserved meet and greets that didnât go through the system, clashings with VidCon (a bigger event), inappropriate content creators, adversied content creators that didnât appear, condoms in the goodie bag, lies about free tickets, no food, no room for anything, one hallway, lack of regulation in wristbands, underestimation of guests, overly expensive merch, no cooling system, no fire solutions (meaning they kicked everyone out) and it goes on.Â
Despite actual people suffering due to the incompetency of Tana, Shane made her out to be an innocent martyr. This gets even worse as you realise than Tana has been exposed for several racist comments throughout her YouTube career.
Shane is clearly shown to be a terrible interviewer, presenting more as a friend than someone who is willing to find the âtruthâ of Tanacon. Instead of learning about Tanacon from an unbiased journalist, we get an obscured version of what happened, engineered to sympathise with Tana instead of her admitting to her mistakes.
Yet, this somehow was only the beginning of the problems with the documentary series, as the next one was with Jeffree Starr.
I donât even know where to begin with the problems with this.
Firstly, Jeffree is perhaps the most problematic YouTuber who is still popular on the website. He has been exposed as racist, sexist, supporting of rapists, terrible to fans, transphobic, ableist, fatphobic, homophobic, insensitive to suicidal people, sexualising of minors, fascist and violent. Check out this thread here for the full details and proof of these claims.
Shane is not stupid. He is aware of these controversies, but has continued to support Jeffree. When a fan called him out, he was extremely rude and was very mad, and supporting all the hate the fan was getting.
The entire documentary series is about him befriending Jeffree, and making him out to be a good person.Â
Jeffree should NOT be given a positive platform like this, and he should NOT be continuing to get away with being âcancelledâ. So many other YouTubers have been âcancelledâ for lesser things, yet Jeffree manages to always get away with it.
The next documentary series was the Jake Paul series. This is perhaps his most controversial documentary series.
Shane is not a therapist, a psychiatrist or a mental health professional. Even though he did consult some people, they are not allowed to diagnose people based on suspicions and videos. Yet, throughout the entire series, he calls Jake Paul a sociopath, and using that label to justify everything he has done.
Jake and Logan have both stirred up some of the biggest controversies on the platform, yet Shane gave them the ability to thrive. Like he did with Tana and Jeffree, he humanised him and edited it to the audience would sympathise with Jake. He has been exposed to scam his young fans, been rude to his neighbours and cast members, made light of serious disorders like anxiety, saying the n word and doing several things for clout, such as âmarryingâ Tana Mongeau.
As addressed in the documentary series, Alissa Violet, Jakeâs ex-girlfriend, has shared her stories of physical abuse in the Team 10 mansion in private life, yet Shane did not fully address this or even mention this to Jake in the episode after. This further proves that Shane is incapable of running a documentary series with such deep themes as he will gloss over them or not address them properly.
This issue is further seen in his documentary with Eugenia Cooney.
A warning that I have not actually seen this as I have heard it contains triggering subject material which I do not wish to subject myself to in interests for my personal mental health - I am only going off the statements of experts and viewers.
In theory, this documentary could have been brilliant. After all, it is two people who have gone/is going through eating disorders and discussing it. However, experts have said that this could be harmful and it is easy to see why.
As much as I do not like Shane, I, and experts, do believe that he had good intentions behind this documentary. However, it probably would have been better if they consulted an expert regularly throughout the documentary when handling a touchy subject. After all, many of Shaneâs viewers are young and/or influential, and a correct portrayal of a subject which is terrifying and real to many people watching is very important.
Here is an excerpt from this article about how he handled this:
Other fans were concerned with Cooney's safety, given that she referred to having an eating disorder in the past tense, signaling that she may not be considering further treatment.
"She certainly looks like she is physically healthier, but mentally she still seems like she's struggling a lot and she tries to cover it with her overwhelming positivity," another comment on the video says.
Experts who spoke with INSIDER â and who have not personally treated Cooney â are wary of considering Cooney's treatment a success story.
"When we are in the midst of our eating disorder we are very, very good at wearing masks. We're very good at playing a role that is very convincing and wants to let people know that we're okay," Chevese Turner, the Chief Strategy & Policy Officer for the National Eating Disorders Association, told INSIDER."A month of treatment is just barely scratching the surface of the road to recovery. While she put on a good face and was very chipper and cheerful, I'm not convinced that's what's going on inside. How do any of us know for sure?"
While both experts told INSIDER they believe Dawson had good intentions, they also expressed numerous concerns with the way the video presented the reality of eating disorders, and Cooney's recovery in particular. Turner says having Cooney share her story could be very cathartic, but she worries how much of her appearance was intended to resurrect or preserve her career."What's essentially happening is that people are bullying her online for her looks and her body and that does have an impact, it impacts all of us when that happens. For someone with an eating disorder, the impact can be devastating. I think [Dawson is] trying to help in his own way, but probably the thing that would help the most is her having more time in recovery," Turner said.
"I don't want to speculate, but obviously her success on YouTube is a driving factor to get back to work. None of us know if she's fully capable for that work and I would want to believe that the people around her who care about her most are confident that she can handle it," she continued. "I hope that they'll encourage her to take a break."
Overall, it has been shown that Shane is unfit to handle a documentary series with his evidently extremely biased views, and he should consult more professionals when editing. Although many people would argue that he has good intentions, it is possible to have good intentions while being irresponsible. Shane is aware of his large audience, and his influence over people around the globe. He should be more careful when creating a video with strong themes which many viewers may be suffering through or offended by.Â
Either than his documentary series, Shane is also friends with other problematic people outside it - most infamously, Trisha Paytas.Â
Trisha Paytasâ brand has become being extremely controversial. However, this doesnât excuse that she has done and should not normalise her behaviours. She has been proved to be very transphobic and homophobic, as well as racist, ableist, abusive and insensitive to people with mental illnesses and disorders, notably DID. She lives to stir up drama on YouTube and more recently, TikTok. Despite being aware of this, Shane has continued to be close friends with her and excusing what she does because sheâs just Trisha.
He has also openly supported far-right people on Twitter, giving harmful conspiracies a platform on his channel.
-
Shane Dawson has contributed to destroying growing/popular channels.
When 20-year-old growing YouTuber Bobby Burns released a video giving valid criticism to Shane Dawson, Shane featured him on his channel and pushed him as a heater.
This was not a thing which only happened once. Shane decided to continue to feature him on his channel, branding him as a hater. However, Shaneâs dedicated fanbase did not like this and began to send hate to Bobby. Due to the lack of popularity, Shane stopped interacting with Bobby and didnât feature him in any more videos without attempting to âsave his careerâ like he has done with so many other people.
That is not to say that Bobby is faultless. I am not that familiar with his content, but I have heard that he did contribute to his channelâs demise, which makes sense. However, as a huge content creator, it was irresponsible of Shane to take a growing channel and brand him as a negative hater. He is aware of his audience, and that is important to remember. When he has such a large fanbase, he needs to be more careful with the videos he is showing them, and the characterisations of YouTubers.
However, what Shane is going under fire most recently is his involvement in the James Charles scandal last year.
Despite denial, Shane has been proved to play an important role in the âcancellingâ of James last year, encouraging Tati to upload the video and making false accusations of predatory behaviour. This was highly likely done to degrade a competitorâs palette so his collaboration with Jeffree would be more successful.
Recently, he posted these screenshots on Twitter and then deleted the Tweet.
This proves his blatant immaturity. Somehow, James, the youngest of the four YouTubers involved in the scandal, has grown up the most. Shane was a part of the downfall of James, causing him to debate suicide. His defence for this was saying that he âneeded to be served a slice of humble pie the size of the fucking Empire State Buildingâ.
James Charles is not faultless, and he should not be made out to be an angel or a martyr in this situation. However, no one deserves to have suicidal thoughts, and anyone who defends this by saying that it was the humbling he needed is disgusting.
-
Shane Dawson attempted to out Dan and Phil for views and clout.
As a bisexual man who has opened up about his fear of being outed when he was closeted, he should be ashamed of everything he did to Dan and Phil.
Like many YouTubers at the time, Shane used the Phandom to get views and subscribers. In doing this, he objectified and sexualised Dan to his young and influential audience. Check out this video where he said that he wanted to facefuck Dan in an orgy while watching a video where he just turned 18. In that clip, he also split up Dan and Phil into âcuteâ and ânot cuteâ.Â
It even went to the point where he asked the Psychic Twins about the sexuality of Dan and Phil. In this clip, he accuses them of queerbaiting as well as supporting the Psychic Twinsâ invasive and insensitive comments about them not dressing gay enough, diss of them refusing to go on their podcast and outing and stereotyping them. This was as recent as 2017.
-
There are actually a lot of other reasons why Shane is under a lot of controversy at the moment. Here were my sources, and some further reading for anyone interested:
THE PROBLEM WITH SHANE DAWSON: a thread
shane dawson sexualizing young children: a thread
One of YouTube's biggest stars made a viral 'documentary' about another YouTuber's eating disorder. Experts say it could be harmful for its subject and audience.
Jake Paul tried to use looting for YouTube views, and is facing charges. These are all the ways the controversial star has stirred up outrage in the past.
Trisha Paytasâ racism
THE PROBLEM WITH JEFFREE STAR: a thread
EVERYTHING WRONG WITH TANACON: an ongoing thread
So what from here? Shane has released an apology video, but words donât mean anything without action. Here are some suggestions for what he could do to actually show further improvement.
He could stop doing conspiracy videos in the harmful and biased style he is known for, and delete his videos despite the views.
He could stop being friends with such toxic and controversial people.
He could donate his money and time to helping out the #BlackLivesMatter movement, and to black charities/organisations in general. It does not negate what he has done, and it is not in my place to forgive him if he does do that, but it would represent his improvement.
He could formally apologise to the parents and the family of the children he has sexualised.
But he will probably not do that. However, as a hater of cancel culture, I hope that he does improve as a person. It is not my goal to send hate, but to inform people. Sending Shane death threats or insensitive comments are the last things we need. To criticise him for doing that, then doing it yourself is hypocritical and harmful. Instead, weâll just have to inform ourselves and wait for the future.
