Felix Kjellberg – the Swedish YouTuber known as “PewDiePie,” became extremely famous after being the first to reach 100 million subscribers on YouTube. Since starting his channel in 2010 and producing over 4,000 videos, Felix has garnered nearly 25 billion views on the platform. Over the years, he has leveraged his high view counts to achieve massive profits. To this day, PewDiePie remains one of the top earners on the platform.
With fame naturally comes unavoidable controversies. In Felix’s case, there are a lot, and I mean a lot of controversies.
PewDiePie Accused of Racism
PewDiePie’s sharp language and humor have been a hallmark of his videos since he started the channel. While this attitude may annoy some people, for the majority of viewers, it is precisely this quirk that defines the PewDiePie brand. However, his career was affected when The Wall Street Journal published an article highlighting that some of PewDiePie’s videos contained content deemed discriminatory.
This quickly led to negative repercussions for him. Maker Studios, owned by Disney, swiftly severed ties with Felix following a wave of backlash. Disney was not the only significant loss for Felix. His YouTube Red show, “Scare PewDiePie,” was canceled, and PewDiePie’s channel was removed from the Google Preferred program. Although he later apologized for his jokes, just a few months later, Felix found himself in hot water again.
Continuing to Face Trouble for Discriminatory Language During Streams
PewDiePie quickly found himself in the middle of another controversy. During a livestream of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, everything changed when Felix used a very inappropriate term, the n-word.
The racist implication led to an immediate backlash on social media, with many condemning Felix. Some fans defended Felix on Twitter, arguing that he used the term unintentionally, so it wasn’t meant to be discriminatory. Although Felix had used similar language in his previous videos, this moment stood out because the term was directed at another person. For some, this made Felix’s apology harder to accept, as insults and discrimination are unforgivable.
Disrespecting Female Streamers
This is perhaps not surprising for PewDiePie, as he often expresses disdain for popular female streamers. PewDiePie believes that these women often don’t provide any content value for the viewers and instead leverage their looks and sex appeal to gain views and donations.
Recently, he even uploaded a video titled with the term “Simp.” For those who don’t know, a simp refers to a loser, a pathetic guy who always “puts girls on a pedestal,” prioritizing women above all else and doing foolish things. Here, PewDiePie uses the term Simp to refer to those who frequently donate to female streamers—something he considers extremely unnecessary and only present among the “lowest of the low.”