Who is Kai Cenat? 'Free Kai' trends as 19-year-old comic gets banned from Twitch during live-stream
#FreeKai is trending on Twitter right now. K-pop fans don't worry, this doesn't have anything to do with your favorite singer, but rather a teen social media celebrity. Kai Cenat is a 19-year-old social media personality known for his meme-based comedic sketches. The hashtag has gone viral after he was inexplicably banned from Twitch, the live streaming service.
It is unclear as of now why Twitch has banned Kai's account. The company and Kai are yet to provide more details. Users first noticed a 'this channel has been suspended' message on his Twitch account at around 12 am. This was followed up shortly by a tweet from Kai, who said, "#FREEKAI BRUH IM DONE WIT THIS SHIT". Since then, the trend has begun taking over Twitter, as many users have called for Twitch to reinstate the comedian.
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He's no small-time creator. Kai has 65.7lk followers on Twitter, 464k on Instagram and 598k on YouTube. How did he become so big? That's what we aim to find out.
Who is Kai Cenat?
According to Famous Birthdays, Kai was born in December 2001 in New York. He reportedly has an older brother, younger brother and a twin sister who have all made appearances in his sketches. It's unclear how much he is worth, but we do know his primary source of income is from endorsements on social media. In 2019, he graduated from the Frederick Douglass Academy in Harlem.
Kai first began posting on Instagram in 2017. In a short amount of time, he gained a huge fan following as he expanded to other platforms. He has two YouTube channels, including one called 'Kai Reacts'. He also acts as a part-model with several photos available on his Instagram page. On May 14, 2020 YouTube awarded him with a silver Creator Award for crossing 100,000 subscribers.
Beyond that, almost no information is available about Kai. We could not find any information about Kai's family. We found a 2015 article that links Kai to the Fresh Air Fund. Wicked Local reported that "every summer Kai Cenat hops on a bus in New York City and heads north for two weeks to explore nature, go hiking, swim in lakes, and visit the beach." He is reportedly hosted by the Parker family every summer since he was seven years old. His older brother and twin sister also participated in the same program, which gives low-income children from New York a chance to explore the outdoors with a volunteer host family.
During a live stream on Twitch, Kai suddenly went offline. Fans were then greeted with a 'channel suspended' notification. He has since posted a video of the live stream on YouTube and put out a series of stories on Instagram reacting to the news. He's not sure why he got banned nor are his followers. One person tweeted, "Man Wtf...... I was watching Kai then he got banned."
Another said, "#freekai the man did nothing wrong, god damn it twitch." One other person tweeted, "WHAT THE HELL BRUHHH that shit was outta his control #freekaicenat #freekai get that shit trending rn"
WHAT THE HELL BRUHHH that shit was outta his control #freekaicenat #freekai get that shit trending rn
— HoodieDan (@hoodie_dan) April 12, 2021
It didn't take long for the hashtag to gain popularity as many more joined the conversation. The trend was boosted by others who assumed something had happened to the K-pop star Kai also known as Kim Jong-in and tweeted in relief when they found that wasn't the case.