James Charles admits messaging 16-year-old boys
James Charles, a 21-year-old YouTuber uploaded a video titled ‘holding myself accountable,’ and began by saying: ‘First and foremost, I need to say sorry. He has admitted to sending sexually explicit messages to two 16-year-old boys.
He posted the confession video to his YouTube page after the recent allegations took over social media that he exchanged sexually explicit messages with minors. In the video, he apologised to fans and told them he was “being reckless.”
He said, “I owe a massive apology to anybody that I’ve hurt or anybody that I’ve made uncomfortable with my actions. And I also want to say I’m sorry to my friends, family and fans that have to watch another one of these videos because you shouldn’t have to and this is really, really embarrassing.”
He added: ‘I want to make it really, really clear that I fully understand my actions and how they are wrong. There’s no excuse for them and I don’t plan on making any in this video either.’
In the past few weeks, two people have come forward saying that they had inappropriate messages from Charles on social media – one last year, and one more recently.
In February he was accused of “grooming,” an act where the offender engages in predatory conduct to prepare a child or minor person for sexual activity before they are actually sexually abused. It can include communicating and/or attempting to establish a relationship.
Most recently a teenage boy posted screenshots from alleged conversations with Charles on TikTok. He claimed that Charles knew he was underage and continued the conversations anyway.
This is not the first time the beauty influencer has faced controversy.
In 2019, BBC reported how Charles was accused of using “fame and money to try to manipulate someone’s sexuality”, which James Charles later denied.
In 2019, he made a video addressing accusations where he promised to be more careful henceforth.
In his recently released video he said, he began “ignoring red flags again”.
The video ended with a vowing to be more cautious in the future.
Featured image: Getty Images/BBC
