The YouTuber KSI has apologised for using a racial slur in a recent video and has said he is going to take a break from social media for the time being.
The 29-year-old is part of a YouTube group called Sidemen and is also known for his music, boxing and being the founder of the Prime hydration drink.
He used the derogatory word in a video that was posted to the Sidemen channel on Sunday (April 2).
In a game based on Countdown, his team had to form the longest possible word from nine letters - and KSI gave "P***" as his attempt.
The word was bleeped out in the video and it has since been removed from the Sidemen YouTube channel, Sky News reported.
I wanna apologise for saying a racial slur in a recent Sidemen video. There’s no excuse, no matter the circumstances, I shouldn’t have said it and I’m sorry.
— ksi (@KSI) April 3, 2023
I’ve always said to my audience that they shouldn’t worship me or put me on a pedestal because I’m human. Im not…
What was the reaction to this clip?
The clip received a lot of backlash online once it was posted, with people commenting on why it was not removed in the editing process.
A sports writer, Umir, tweeted: "Been a KSI fan for the longest but so weird for him to say 'p***' in the latest Sidemen vid even if they bleeped it & it was 'in jest' for content Other racial slurs wouldn't be used as punchlines for YouTube gameshows. Just makes light of the word + certain people's experience.
"Fact the Sidemen team didn't edit it out suggests they were fine with it in which is so mad to me. They didn't think the use of the word for cheap laughs was an issue. That minimises the topic's significance. Racial abuse toward Asians is taken less seriously, more of the time."
Another person posted: "The Sidemen have a whole team of people that see their videos before they’re released and no one thought KSI saying P*** was inappropriate enough to cut out of their latest video. Kmt racism towards South Asians is so normalised, no one even sees a problem with it."
Fellow YouTuber Troopz commented on the issue and said: "I don’t find this funny one bit smh, disappointed in @KSI and the whole of the panel too smh."
KSI apologised for his use of the word on Monday and he posted: "I wanna apologise for saying a racial slur in a recent Sidemen video. There’s no excuse, no matter the circumstances, I shouldn’t have said it and I’m sorry.
"I’ve always said to my audience that they shouldn’t worship me or put me on a pedestal because I’m human. Im not perfect, I’m gonna mess up in life, and lately I’ve been messing up a lot.
"So I’ve decided I’m gonna just take a break from social media for a while."
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