Anti-Semitic Joke Costs PewDiePie His YouTube Stardom And Disney Relationship

There are few things in the world that can end a person’s career faster than an ill-thought comment, even if it came in the form of a joke. YouTube star PewDiePie or Felix Kjellberg learned this the hard way when he made an anti-Semitic joke. Now, not only is his preferred platform treating him like a pariah, he also lost a lucrative deal with Disney.

In the hours that followed Disney’s announcement that it would be cutting ties with the popular YouTube figure, the video hosting platform itself made it known that the reality show “Scare PewDiePie” was canceled, Variety reports. This comes on the heels of a series of videos that Kjellberg posted several weeks ago containing people carrying signs that read “Death to All Jews” and a Jesus-cosplaying character saying that “Hitler did absolutely nothing wrong.”

According to Kjellberg, this was not at all intended to be taken literally as it is actually a comedic commentary on how absurdly liberal a service called “Fiverr” is when it comes to the kinds of transactions that it allows. In fact, Kjellberg was only able to post the videos after paying the people shown in them to commit such acts through the service. It would appear that both YouTube and Disney did not find it humorous.

“We’ve decided to cancel the release of ‘Scare PewDiePie’ season 2 and we’re removing the PewDiePie channel from Google Preferred,” a YouTube spokesperson said.

The videos themselves have been taken offline, though, not before they were viewed millions of times. In any case, Kotaku points out that the effects of the show’s cancellation on PewDiePie’s income and the termination of his collaboration with Disney aren't clear. There’s bound to be some impact on his ability to earn money, but he will still be able to get ad revenue through his regular channel.