Disney drops YouTube star PewDiePie over anti-Semitic content
The company’s Maker Studios said the influential social media personality ‘clearly went too far’ when he posted videos featuring the ‘ultimately offensive’ language and images.
Such is the case with Swedish YouTube star Felix Kjellberg, known to his followers as “PewDiePie.” At 27, Kjellberg has amassed a gigantic following: More than 53 million people are subscribed to his main YouTube channel, which has roughly 14.7 billion views.
He has attained his influential status by creating videos that show him playing video games, and his content is often littered with profanity and adult jokes. That didn’t stop him from nabbing partnerships with YouTube, Google and Walt Disney Co. (Kjellberg reportedly made more than $15 million last year.)
However, Kjellberg seems to have gone too far with his risqué content.
On Jan. 11, he posted a video that many are calling anti-Semitic.
In the YouTube clip, a pair of South Asian men wearing costume loincloths held up a banner that read, “DEATH TO ALL JEWS.”
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