YouTube’s beauty community imploded after popular makeup guru Tati Westbrook made damaging claims against young influencer James Charles in her viral “Bye Sister” video – but FaZe co-owner Ricky Banks thinks there was more to Tati’s allegations than a mere “wakeup call.”
Banks published a series of Tweets on May 18 appearing to accuse Tati of using her beef with Charles as a means to advertise her vitamin brand, ‘Halo Beauty,’ even demanding that she come forward with Halo’s profits in wake of the drama.
However, Banks wasn’t finished speaking out on the debacle just yet; he went on to upload a video discussing the drama the very next day, where he called Tati’s actions “malicious” and “evil.”
Hey Tati, @GlamLifeGuru would it be too much to ask to share Halo Beautys sales report over the last month. I think we'd all appreciate/ like to know the impact this scandal had on your products success. If none of it was about vitamins then it really shouldn't matter, right?
— FaZe Banks (@Banks) May 18, 2019
“She flat out lied, exaggerated, manipulated through that whole video,” Banks said of the issue, claiming that Tati made Charles out to be a “sexual predator” by alleging that he’d used his fame to “manipulate” a straight man’s sexuality.
Banks even calculated an estimate of how much Tati likely earned from her “Bye Sister” video, speculating that Tati made at least $19.6 million in profits from Halo Beauty’s sales due to emotionally invested” fans and “impulse buys.”
“If Tati’s video converted just 1% of the people who watched that video – just 1%, which is a very normal conversion rate – her product costs $40,” Banks explained. “…that would mean Tati and her company had sold $19.6 worth of product.”
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Banks isn’t alone in his thinking, either; YouTube king Felix ‘PewDiePie’ Kjellberg expressed similar sentiments in his own video on the matter, calling Tati’s video “an advertisement” for Halo Beauty.
[Timestamp: 10:23 for mobile users]
“What has that to do with Tati’s brands?” Felix said of her statement, laughingly. “This is an ad.”
While PewDiePie went on to express sympathy for Tati in a later video, he still felt that the two ought to resolve their issues in private, arguing that Tati was “unjustified” in bringing their feud into the spotlight, considering the major damage done to Charles’ career and subscriber count.
Tati has since claimed that she is taking a “digital break” from the drama and is collecting her thoughts before moving forward, while YouTuber Jeffree Star threatens to expose “receipts” about Charles’ “manipulative” behavior in response to his follow-up video on the matter.