YouTuber Colleen Ballinger Of Miranda Sings Fame Responds To Grooming Allegations By Her Fans In A Bizarre Video Where She's Playing A Ukulele The Entire Time
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I think we've officially lost the plot. I saw this on Twitter and my jaw dropped. Apparently this is the YouTuber Miranda Sings? I don't really know who she is, but pulling out a ukulele for a 10 minute video where you respond to allegations of grooming and exploitation is unreal. The AV Club broke down everything that has allegedly happened.
To understand what’s going on, we have to rewind to 2020, when a YouTuber named Adam McIntyre shared the negative experiences he had with Ballinger as a longtime Miranda Sings fan. He became a fan when he was nine years old, eventually running a Twitter fan account and subsequently joining an “inner circle” of stans with whom Ballinger would communicate directly. McIntyre accused Ballinger of sending him inappropriately sexualized messages (like asking his favorite sex position) while he was a teenager, and even mailing him a set of underwear (bra and panties) after telling fans she wanted to get rid of “ugly” unused clothes, per HuffPost U.K. In response, Ballinger denied accusations of grooming, but admitted to sending the underwear, saying it was a “stupid” thing for her to do.
Ballinger’s fans turned on McIntyre after he came forward with his accusations (which also included Ballinger exploiting him for the free labor of posting on her social media accounts). Otherwise, the controversy died down until June 2023, when another fan came forward to corroborate McIntyre’s story. Since then, the floodgates have opened and many fans have chimed in with their own negative stories of being bullied or manipulated by Ballinger and her friends and family.
Per a Rolling Stone report, these issues range from body shaming to being sexualized on stage. Some of her inner circle fans (members of a group chat called “Colleenies Weenies”) felt Ballinger tacitly encouraged them to attack her detractors online, including her ex-husband. Multiple fans, who were high schoolers at the time, shared that Ballinger would unload on them about her ex Joshua Evans’ “emotionally abusive” ways and the devastation of their breakup. At least one fan, Johnny Silvestri, spoke of being hired in a professional capacity (to work on Ballinger’s Miranda Sings tour), where he was exploited, verbally abused, and drawn into a toxic parasocial dynamic (one that Evans, at least, has acknowledged and apologized for).
No one is going to say that Miranda didn't sing though. She got accused of grooming and she hit us with a 10 minute Disney Channel intro. Slight credit for saying that her PR team told her that she couldn't say what she wanted to, but they never told her that she couldn't sing it. Check and mate. I got through the entire video for the purpose of being a credible journalist and so you, the blog reader doesn't have to, and she didn't apologize a single time and instead called these accusations "toxic gossip". Someone get her manager and PR team bourbon on the rocks because it's going to be a long night now that Twitter got a hold of this.
This joins a long line of idiotic apology videos we've seen on YouTube, and every single time I think I've seen it all I'm wrong. This is like when Michael Jackson did the moonwalk on top of a car outside of court during his trial for child molestation. Just some bizarro world stuff that makes you wonder how these YouTubers go through life the way they do. We give fame to the wrong people. Then again, life might just be a test server with a bunch of robots seeing how long we can last. This may be my breaking point. But if I ever get cancelled I'm pulling out an ocarina to address the allegations. Notes app apologies are so 2017.
I honestly think you could ChatGPT an apology for grooming allegations that would come across infinitely better than this and I'm not even PR trained. I'm not going to try it for fear of getting a knock on my door, but one of you with a little more balls go ahead and see what it spits out and post the results here. No chance it's worse than this.
Nothing says quirky more than a ukulele, but I say it's time we return back to crying in front of the camera holding your dog and telling everyone you're a great person. For now, we'll always have this video in a truly what the fuck is going on moment. Thanks Miranda.