The YouTube beauty community is absolutely shooketh over the drama going down between James Charles and Tati Westbrook — as are their fans.
This looks like the end of a monumental friendship — the end of an era, if you will, and the tea is piping hot.
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Okay, first and foremost, if you missed all the drama that went down between James Charles and Tati Westbrook over the weekend, don’t worry.
I’m going to make you an expert on the topic, momentarily.
Who doesn’t love a great friendship-breakup story, amirite?
This is Tati Westbrook.
This brunette bombshell is basically The Beatles of the YouTube beauty community. She is one of the original beauty YouTubers that has paved the way for everyone else — especially James Charles.
And she is the founder of Halo Beauty.
So yeah, you could say she’s a big deal.
This is James Charles.
He’s an19-year-old beauty and makeup wizard that has racked up more than 16 million YouTube subscribers in just two years.
But here’s the catch: He wouldn’t be where he is today without the help of Tati.
For all of this to make sense, we’re going to have to go way back in time.
Back to when James’ and Tati’s friendship first started budding.
James has repeatedly spoken highly of Tati, crediting her for inspiring him to pursue a career in beauty in the first place and thanking her for taking him under his wing.
In 2017, Tati flew James out to her wedding to do her makeup.
The two formed what looked like an unstoppable mentor and mentee bond that doubled as a genuine friendship.
Fast forward to now: Tati posted a 40-minute long video explaining why she’s decided to cut ties with James.
I bet you’re thinking, “wait, I thought you just said they had an unstoppable bond? What changed?” and “40-minute video? Thank you, next.”
But rest assured, I will summarize this for you in way less than 40 minutes.
The drama commenced back in April, when James promoted Sugar Bear Hair vitamins on his Instagram story.
Sugar Bear Hair is one of Halo Beauty’s major competitors.
Surely you see where this is going…
Tati saw James’ Insta story and immediately felt betrayed.
After everything she and her husband had done to kickstart James’ career that ultimately led to him being wealthy and famous, she couldn’t believe that he would publicly promote her company’s direct competitor to his millions of fans.
“Everybody says what they need to say and uses who they need to use, and I have had about enough,” Tati said in her story.
“It’s not right,” she continued.
In response to Tati’s Insta video, James posted this written apology in his story.
He explains that he didn’t intentionally promote Sugar Bear Hair vitamins as a way to undermind Tati — but that it was more of a thoughtless act.
Up until now, Tati hadn’t publicly shared a response to James’ apology.
But after stewing on it for a couple of weeks, she’s finally given the people what they want.
In her 40-minute video, Tati revealed that James had refused to advertise Halo Beauty vitamins on his channel because he didn’t feel “comfortable” promoting supplements to his young, impressionable fans.
But he later made a deal with Sugar Bear Hair — which contradicts his earlier stance on not wanting to promote supplements to his fans.
Tati went on, explaining how she and her husband feel “used” by James.
Tati and her husband mentored James and negotiated deals on his behalf to help move along his career.
She had even promoted James’ palette on her channel and slipped his Morphe discount code in several of her videos.
But she doesn’t feel that everything she and her husband have done for him is being appreciated or reciprocated.
She also revealed that she’s tired of having to apologize for James’ poor behavior.
In the past, James has candidly made disrespectful comments about other members in the YouTube beauty guru community, Jaclyn Hill and Marlena Stell.
He had also made comments about wanting to hook up with a male waiter, no matter the waiter’s sexual orientation.
She wrapped up her video by politely explaining that this situation is very personal to her and nothing to do with business anymore.
“For you to lie to me and make me the villain, and go around and circulate a story to work on your side saying I’m loving the drama because it’s improving sales,” Tati said.
That’s not the case. You’re my family, I love you still… this is not about money at all.”
James then posted a video to his channel titled “tati”, apologizing for basically, everything. Right down to his crass comments about wanting to hook up with a potentially straight waiter.
“I am so disappointed in myself that I hurt her,” he said.
James has since lost millions of YouTube subscriptions in just a few days, breaking some records that I’m sure he didn’t want to break.
