James Charles wants you to forget he sexted fans
It hasn't been the redemption arc he was hoping for.
Keep scrolling for a deep dive into Gwen the (wannabe) Milkmaid.
James Charles would like to be un-canceled, please
In the wake of the grooming allegations against Colleen Ballinger, James Charles has decided to confront the accusations levelled against him head-on. In a new piece for Cosmopolitan, journalist Gabrielle Bluestone interviewed the creator about life post-cancellation and his new makeup line, Painted. But despite James’ best efforts to appeal to the masses, internet users are less than impressed.
Back in February 2021, James faced around fifteen allegations of sexual impropriety, including claims of sexting and grooming minors, as well as abusing the fan-influencer power dynamic for his own agenda.
While James addressed the accusations on his YouTube channel at the time, Bluestone’s interview offers new insights into the aftermath of the cancellation— many of which have proven to be controversial among readers.
The profile starts with James reflecting on how the past two years have impacted him and his career. He acknowledges that he made a "big mistake" and admits feeling "absolutely mortified" by his behaviour.
“I had to do a lot of thinking. Like, Okay, babe, this is your fault. No, you’re not a pedophile. No, you’re not a fucking groomer. No, you’re not a predator. But you made a big mistake,” James says.
While the influencer appeared apologetic, he did defend himself against some of the accusations. He maintains that many of the claims against him were "completely fake" and that he never knowingly engaged with a minor.
Bluestone corroborates the creator’s story, sharing that she reached out to one accuser who admitted to lying about "telling [James] I was 18 a few years ago.”
Despite this revelation, many internet users believe that some of James' comments were inadvertent admissions of guilt—most notably, that his brother cut communication with him, and that they haven't spoken in two years.
Others found comments about James’ dating life to be concerning, especially when he seemed to attribute the lack of "famous male gay celebrities from the ages of 20 to 25" as a reason for resorting to social media to seek potential partners.
With most of the piece defending the influencer's behaviour, many readers see the profile as a relatively transparent attempt to build hype for Painted. It's safe to say that this interview probably isn't the redemption arc James hoped for.
Read the full profile via Cosmopolitan.
Meredith Duxbury collaborates with Morphe on limited-edition makeup collection
TikTok star Meredith Duxbury joins forces with Morphe as the brand attempts to capture the Gen Z dollar.
The collaboration, announced Tuesday, is a limited edition makeup collection featuring six products including an eyeshadow palette, a foaming face primer, an all-over gloss for the face, lips, and eyes, a lip liner, and a brow-sculpting wax and brush duo.
“I am incredibly proud of my new @morphebrushes X Meredith collection. 🩵🫶🏻 I’ve been working on this for over a year and put so much effort into designing and creating each and every product for all of you to love,” Meredith wrote on Instagram.
As one of the biggest beauty creators on TikTok (with over 18 million followers), Meredith is best known for creating eye-catching videos where she uses nearly half a bottle of foundation on her face every time she glams.
Some feel this was a missed opportunity for Morphe to release an ultra full-coverage foundation with Meredith, or even a super-sized foundation bottle.
The Morphe x Meredith Duxbury collection comes as the brand’s parent company, Forma Brands, emerges from Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings with new owners.
Interestingly, this collaboration contrasts Morphe’s reported brand strategy moving forward. In April 2023, Forma Brands president Simon Cowell said that Morphe’s “evolution really is now focused on what I call a product first beauty brand, not an influencer first beauty brand.”
Doug Jacob, co-founder of &vest, which helped acquire Forma Brands following its bankruptcy filing, mimicked this sentiment.
“From the outside in, these high-level influencers that wanted to partner with Morphe was because Morphe was actually a special brand itself. But what ended up happening is we became the influencer as opposed to the brand developing what its core values are, which is why we’re stepping back. We’re still leveraged like every beauty brand with partners, we have fantastic partners in the celebrity space, but this brand itself deserves to stand on its own just like other great brands in the space,” he said.
However, Forma executives did note that Morphe’s new influencer strategy would be primarily focused on TikTokers— which is where Meredith comes in.
The Morphe x Meredith Duxbury collection is available on Morphe’s website from July 20th.
See the full collaboration via Morphe.
Pinkydoll & the double standards of NPC streaming on TikTok
A TikTok live stream recording of @pinkydollreal has gone viral, showing her popping popcorn on her hair straightener, reciting strange catchphrases and thanking her viewers for sending gifts.
Pinkydoll, whose real name is Fedha Sinon, is a creator who imitates “Non-Playable Characters” on live stream.
For those unfamiliar with gaming, NPCs are computer-controlled characters that are programmed to interact with users. With these avatars being automated, they often exhibit some pretty bizarre behaviour.
During her streams, Pinkydoll mimics an NPC by reacting to viewers when they send gifts. She has a variety of repetitive movements and catchphrases, such as "gang gang" and "mm, coconut so good."
To gift creators on live, users must be 18 years or older and purchase coins through the TikTok app. While the cost varies between currencies, Twitter user @TrungTPhan found that one TikTok coin is approximately worth 1.3 cents in the United States.
Live gifting boosts the stream’s popularity and can even translate into monetary rewards for the creator.
According to TikTok’s support page, “Through LIVE Gifts, you can collect Diamonds, which are awarded based on the popularity of your LIVE videos…As a creator, one way you can collect Diamonds is to receive Gifts from viewers on your LIVE videos. Once you collect Diamonds, you may obtain a Reward Payment in money or in virtual items.”
But that doesn’t explain why viewers would want to shell out the cash to gift creators. TikTok user @dietz_meredith explains how NPC streaming is widely considered a form of fetish content.
“Enough people out there have something of a ‘control fetish,’ and that drives them to donate in exchange for feeling like they are controlling this real human, like their own personal video game character,” Meredith explains.
In light of this, male creators and viewers have criticised Pinkydoll’s intentions - labelling her streams as "degrading" in the name of financial gain. Internet culture experts Kat Tenbarge and Ryan Broderick have defended the streamer, noting how men who create similar content receive praise for their business acumen and success.
Read the full story via Centennial World.
ASMR YouTuber GwenGwiz re-emerges as tradwife TikToker— but is she for real?
In more TikTok news, users are questioning the authenticity of @GwenTheMilkmaid after it was revealed that she was previously a popular bisexual ASMR creator. Long-time viewers believe she is pretending to be a tradwife influencer for clout, while others claim she has been heading down the alt-right pipeline for years.
Gwen Swinarton joined YouTube in 2011 and later launched her now-ASMR channel, GwenGwiz. She was vegan, openly identified as queer, and posted content that was pro-feminism and pro-body positivity.
TikTok users such as @lighticegirly and @virgotherachel were among the first to address how she has changed over the years. Both users noted that Gwen has deleted early videos, specifically content that included her former girlfriend.
After the pair broke up, Gwen started dating a man and even questioned whether her bisexuality was a "phase." It was around this time she launched her second channel, Growing With Gwen.
From the start of her career, Gwen has been sexualised by a large portion of her audience, leading her to start an OnlyFans account in July 2020.
That same month, Gwen moved from downtown Toronto to the suburbs— this is when fans claim she started posting 'crunchy' content on her Growing with Gwen channel.
Once an influencer goes ‘crunchy,’ they are more vulnerable to fear-mongering and conspiracies— something that many viewers claim Gwen fed into.
Her interest in ‘crunchy’ topics like homesteading, birth control and spirituality coincided with COVID-19 lockdowns, where she later credited these restrictions for the reason she “woke up” to the liberal agenda.
After taking a break from her Growing With Gwen channel in the second half of 2021, she returned in December 2022 with seemingly more extreme beliefs.
“For the last two years, especially, I’ve felt this need to censor myself and not be my true authentic self and not share my real opinions [on YouTube], and I don’t want to do that anymore,” she said in her first video back.
While Gwen is on an indefinite break from ASMR, she is still posting on OnlyFans—leading some TikTok users to believe that she is cosplaying as a tradwife as a form of fetish content. But for many others, the birth of Gwen The Milkmaid suggests her transition from progressive, queer ASMR creator to ‘crunchy’ influencer is complete.
Read the full breakdown via Centennial World
The Internet weighs in on Barbie
With the long-awaited Barbie movie finally hitting cinemas, social media users are buzzing with excitement as reviews pour in. The film has been met with universal acclaim on Metacritic and holds an impressive score of 89% on Rotten Tomatoes, confirming that Barbie does indeed live up to the hype.
Critics, journalists, and viewers are heaping praise on Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach's storytelling, commending their ability to incorporate meaningful thoughts and ideas about modern womanhood, without making the film feel like a “two-hour mindless commercial” for Mattel.
“Rather than turn away from the baggage, the movie unpacks it. What was it about these dolls we loved, and what is it about them that now causes such divisive emotional reactions?… Let’s have [Barbie and Ken] question what it means to be plastic role models that run up against modern attitudes about womanhood and Neanderthal notions of manhood,” David Fear writes for Rolling Stone.
The campy self-awareness that sits at the heart of the Barbie movie is endearing to many. However, some reviewers feel that it limits the film's scope, leading it to "talk itself in circles."
“There’s a streak of defensiveness to Barbie, as though it’s trying to anticipate and acknowledge any critiques lodged against it before they’re made, which renders it emotionally inert despite the efforts at wackiness,” Alison Willmore shares for Vulture.
But others claim that this self-referential approach saves the film— allowing Barbie to address the historical problems with the doll while themes of feminism and patriarchy "intersect with real plot stakes" when the characters move between Barbie Land and the Real World.
“Gerwig smartly realizes that whereas a real-life Barbie would face only skepticism and critique, Ken is the ultimate empty vessel just waiting to be filled up with nonsense,” David Sims writes for The Atlantic. “But Barbie never descends into a cheap girls-versus-boys final showdown; it just reckons with the different ways self-image gets sold to us, the weary, willing consumer, even as the world grows savvier and more cynical.”
Follow along with the Barbie reviews via Metacritic.
Delulu Girls, Situationships & Therapy Speak: How TikTok Impacts Gen Z Dating
This week’s infinite scroll podcast explores how TikTok is affecting the dating landscape for Gen Z, including the rise of therapy speak and the concepts of the delulu girl and situationships. To add some expert context to this conversation, we brought on Lucille McCart, APAC Communications Director for Bumble, to speak with us.
Listen to the full episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube.