James Donaldson, better known as MrBeast, is one of the most influential figures on social media; he is also facing numerous allegations regarding his employees’ online behavior, safety concerns regarding his contests and doubts about the authenticity of his million-view videos.
Since creating his YouTube channel in 2012, Donaldson has posted thousands of videos featuring his original ideas and accumulated over 313 million subscribers. He has reeled in millions because of his high-quality content and his philanthropic lifestyle. His videos are known to be fast-paced, with highly-priced giveaways and challenges such as “$456,000 Squid Game In Real Life!” and “Last To Leave Circle Wins $500,000.” Outside of YouTube, Donaldson co-founded TeamTrees and TeamSeas to clean up millions of pounds of trash in oceans, while also funding the planting of millions of trees.
But after various allegations surfaced over the summer, Donaldson now faces an uncertain future in his role as MrBeast. The first domino fell after Prism42 posted a video on June 13, alleging that Donaldson’s close friend and cast member Ava Kris Tyson groomed a 13-year-old. Then, on July 23, Tyson apologized for her behavior and decided to leave MrBeast to focus on her family and mental health. The next day, Donaldson announced that he would remove Tyson from the company and opened an investigation through an independent third party. Donaldson added that he would only take action based on the investigation’s findings.
Shortly after, contestants on his game show, “Beast Games” — which began filming on July 15 — spoke out about the unorganized production and unfavorable conditions on the set, citing their lack of food, medication and sleep. With 1,000 contestants competing for $5 million over the span of a month, many contestants were injured and some even hospitalized during the show. A contestant stated the MrBeast team had denied food to diabetics and denied water to contestants, resulting in at least two individuals suffering seizures.
Following these remarks, YouTuber DogPack404 uploaded an hour-long video alleging that MrBeast uses CGI in some of his videos, accusing him of hosting fake competitions. After this video went viral, Chucky, one of MrBeast’s employees, debunked some of these allegations.
On Aug. 29, DogPack404 posted “MrBeast’s Secret CEO,” a video accusing MrBeast’s alleged cousin, James Warren, of alleged domestic violence and involvement with fraud. While DogPack404 retracted his statement in a Sept. 5 update, MrBeast is still surrounded by controversy due to the events that took place earlier in the summer.
Due to backlash from other creators and viewers, MrBeast only gained 6 million subscribers in August, much less than the 28 million subscribers gained in June before the allegations surfaced. However, the allegations have not forced his channel to lose subscribers and he has continued posting regular content.
Although MrBeast has given away over $40 million, raised over $50 million for charitable causes and boasts the most YouTube subscribers in the world, he is still the target of countless accusations of authenticity and contestant safety that threaten his growth as a content creator.
For us as viewers, this episode underscores that content creators’ generosity may just be a ploy to gain more publicity and profit for themselves. For example, the central issue with creators posting giveaways is the credibility behind these videos. It is extremely difficult for viewers to confirm the randomness of a giveaway, and we can’t guarantee that the winner of these giveaways will receive the prize.
As more AI deep fakes continue to develop, it will become easier for creators to fake content or hide production failures, so viewers should be cautious in committing money or time to what might turn out to be dubious or dangerous offers.
The lesson to remember: Just because MrBeast portrays himself as a selfless philanthropist doesn’t mean he actually is one.
