Beauty YouTuber James Charles has apologised for flirting with underaged fans on Snapchat, saying that he “fucked up”.
On April 1, the YouTube star released a 14-minute video, titled “holding myself accountable”, that featured the 21-year-old makeup artist apologising for his recent behaviour on Snapchat.
James said that unlike his other videos, this one wasn’t scripted.
“First and foremost, I need to say sorry,” he said. “I owe a massive apology to anyone I have hurt or anybody I made uncomfortable with my actions.”
He continued, “I want to make it really, really clear that I fully understand my actions and how they are wrong. There are no excuses for them and I don’t plan on making any in this video, either.”
James acknowledged that people might make light of the video, considering he posted it on April Fool’s Day, but assured viewers that nothing about the video is meant to be taken as a joke.
“I don’t want to wait any longer to speak about this,” he said.
James explained that within the past couple of weeks, two different people under the age of 18 have come forward saying they had shared “inappropriate messages” with the beauty influencer on social media.
“One of them being from last year and one of them being more recent,” he said.
“In both of these cases, I added these people on Snapchat, asked how old they were right away, was told they were 18, believed them, engaged in a flirty conversation, and then later on found out that they were actually 16.
“Upon finding out, I was immediately embarrassed and blocked both people.”
One of the 16-year-olds told Insider that he did not lie about his age to James.
When he first learned of the allegations, James said he initially wanted to make another video with receipts, like he usually does, but ultimately realised that none of that mattered because he “fucked up”.
“I need to take accountability for my actions and ultimately apologise to the people who were affected by them,” he said.
“These conversations should have never happened, point blank, period. There is no excuse for it, there is no ifs, ands, or buts, and I take full responsibility for that.”
James said that he could have and should have looked at these people’s public social media profiles, which would have revealed their true ages to him.
“Therefore these conversations wouldn’t have happened in the first place, but I didn’t do the research, and that is what is so embarrassing,” he said.
“As an adult, it is my job and my responsibility to verify who I’m talking to and therefore there is nobody to blame for this other than myself.
“I’m sorry that I added you, I’m sorry that I flirted with you and I’m really sorry if I made you uncomfortable. It is completely unacceptable.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsjwRp8_lWA
Last month, James shared a statement to Twitter responding to allegations of grooming from a 16-year-old TikTok user. The accuser alleged that he received explicit photos from James, who asked for some back.
The allegations, which were included in a TikTok video, reportedly contained screenshots of the messages between the two, but were later removed from both TikTok and Twitter.
At the time, James denied the allegations and accused the user of having an “ulterior motive from the beginning”.
