David Dobrik announces Tesla giveaway on his birthday, Internet demands proper apology for racist comments
Owning up to a mistake is considered a good way to redeem oneself. However, if your apology is not genuine, you will never be forgiven – especially by the internet. Popular YouTuber David Dobrik seems to be that person. For his 24th birthday on July 23, he announced on Instagram, "Hey guys for my birthday GFUEL and I wanna give these teslas to yall!! Just follow me and @gfuelenergy, share this to your story and tag a friend in the comments! Choosing winners on Monday! No purchase necessary. Exclusions apply. Terms and conditions apply #gfuel #ad #davidstesla.”
This didn’t go down well with Internet users, who reminded him of his racist comments in the past and how his apology was not good enough. Dobrik had apologized for old videos on his podcast 'VIEWS with David Dobrik and Jason Nash', which resurfaced earlier this month, where he appeared to make racially insensitive comments. But the internet wasn’t convinced.
An Insider report stated that Dobrik did not address the specific criticism directly. Rather, he started by making a statement about attending the Black Lives Matter protests and what it was like to receive DMs about supporting the movement. "That's when I realized, hoy sh*t, there's people who are seriously looking up to me for things more than just something goofy," he said. "I think for a while I was just kind of like, I'm the goofball, that's what I am. But I think there are parts of this where I need to be more serious because I want to be a good role model for the people watching."
He added that he was "ashamed and embarrassed" by some of his past videos and Vines that have resurfaced.
Earlier this month, on July 18, according to a report, the Slovak Youtuber was trending on Twitter. Many, however, seemed to be disappointed with the reason why. He had tweeted a video of himself wearing an Iron Man costume and captioned the video, "I waited three months for this to come in the mail hahahah." People were still expecting a sincere apology from him.
Even on his birthday the reason for which he was trending, annoyed netizens. A Twitter user wrote: "David Dobrik ain't even funny. He just racist and loud with a weird laugh and all his lil fans dig that sh*t. On to the next white boy.” Another said, "So can David Dobrik apologize for being racist and unfunny now or what." An angry user wrote: "Thought David Dobrik was trending bc he was finally being held accountable for saying the ---- word but he's giving away another tesla?? Bye."
Another user concurred, "Me seeing David Dobrik trending for the 1000th time and it’s about another Tesla but not about him saying the --- word or mocking Asian language/culture." A Twitter user also said, "Saw David Dobrik trending and thought we were finally holding him accountable for this but nah it's just his birthday." A user even dug out a video clip of Dobrik and his former girlfriend YouTuber Liza Koshy, in what appears to be Koshy mocking the Asian accent.
The user wrote: "Thinking about how people still stan David dobrik and Liza Koshy when they were blatantly racist here, KNEW it was wrong, and STILL continued to mock Asian speech." According to a Deadline report in June, Koshy has apologized on Instagram. She wrote, "What I once thought of as 'innocent jokes' were actually tainted with implicit bias and what might have been intended as 'playful' was actually to some, incredibly painful. And for that, I am sorry."