PewDiePie has to explain that his $50,000 pledge to an anti-hate group is legit

[Horza]

In a video yesterday, Felix “Pewdiepie” Kjellberg announced a generous $50,000 donation to the Anti-Defamation League, a 100-year-old advocacy organization founded to combat anti-Semitism. Kjellberg, who was celebrating his 100,000,000-follower touchstone on YouTube, explained in his video that “I feel like I’ve finally come to terms with the responsibility I have as a creator."

It’s unambiguously good for a respected anti-hate group to receive a cash boon, and Kjellberg followed up with a Tweet today to say his motive was earnest. But a contingent of Kjellberg’s followers aren’t convinced he did it out of the goodness of his heart, The Verge first reported. Hundreds of fans, posting on 4chan, Twitter and Reddit, are spreading the conspiracy theory that Kjellberg was “blackmailed” into donating to the ADL. Several emphatically believe that the ADL threatened Kjellberg with bad press or censorship on YouTube in exchange for the money.

In the meantime, it appears moderators of the subreddit dedicated to Pewdiepie fandom have been assiduously removing comments perpetuating the conspiracy theory. One attempt to clear things up yesterday in a pinned post by noting that “Felix donated to the ADL. He is not controlled by, employed by or in any other way affiliated with the ADL.” They added, “I have been called a ‘jew,’ ‘rabbi,’ ‘goyim’ hundreds of times in my DMs over the past 24 hours.” Source