The Controversy Behind Shane Dawson's and Jeffree Star's "Controversy" Palette

Two of the biggest names in content creation within the Youtube universe, Shane Dawson and Jeffree Star, recently joined forces to collaborate on a project that took the internet by storm. The two initially worked together on a video series for Shane’s channel, which specializes in documentary styled content, where Shane brought his viewers into Jeffree’s life and makeup line. The documentary became one of Shane’s most viewed videos with the promise of a future collaboration. Like most Youtuber’s, Shane and Jeffree have undergone their fair share of scandals, mostly relating to racist videos and tweets from their past, and many viewers found issues with the traction and fame they received after the post. Skeptics believe that the two should not be praised due to their past, while fans support their content and merchandise because both have apologized and owned up to their behavior. This debate on whether to support Shane Dawson and Jeffree Star became quite an internet controversy, yet they recently used this to their advantage. 

Controversy in Collaboration

Throughout the past few months, Shane Dawson and Jeffree Star have been releasing episodes announcing their latest collaboration. Due to their legendary status on Youtube and numerous scandals throughout their time on the internet, it was a given that this joint project held the ability to break the internet. Aside from his Youtube channel, Jeffree Star owns a makeup brand that has gained incredible popularity and has even been labeled as a game-changer in the beauty community, revolutionizing how makeup itself is created, advertised, and sold. Once news broke out that the project the two were hinting at would be a documentary series not only involving the creation of their line itself, but also the inner workings and drama behind the beauty community, fans were excited and already prepared to buy the entire collection. 

Although the documentary created anticipation for the launch, viewers felt incredibly underwhelmed by the content they were given. Instead of the drama-filled exposure of the Youtube beauty community, everyone was promised, viewers seemed to only receive the process of making the collection. The Youtube viewing community can be unforgiving at times, especially when the creators themselves are constantly involved in scandals that insult those who support them. The beauty community on Youtube itself is notorious for being public about the drama between creators, contaminated cosmetic collaborations, and socially unacceptable behavior. Jeffree Star is known for his involvement in these community altercations, never being one to shy away from expressing his opinion to his fans. So, the combination of Shane’s simple and transparent video style and Jeffree’s unabashed candor promised a never before seen look inside the Youtube beauty community, but that didn’t happen. While fans were disappointed with the documentary, they were still excited to purchase this iconic collection, but once the day arrived for fans to finally be able to purchase the Shane Dawson X Jeffree Star collection and Controversy palette, the website experienced many errors and would continually shut down, making it incredibly difficult for anyone to get their hands on the items. 

Although the website issues were fixed and the entire Controversy collection sold out, the fans who were unable to buy anything were angry. Not only did they feel scammed by the documentary, but they also were left with sold-out products. After days of Twitter apologies from both Shane and Jeffree, the two released another episode of the documentary that not only showcased what went wrong on launch day but also dived into a little bit of the beauty community drama everyone was promised. The video properly explains what happened during launch and it was as simple as too much traffic on the website. Despite Jeffree and Shane preparing for their collaboration to be one of the biggest product launches for Jeffree Star Cosmetics, the website itself could not handle the number of people attempting to purchase the same items all at the same time. Also, Jeffree Star Cosmetics does not personally run the website, and during the launch, the video shows their team on the phone with the website’s developers doing everything they possibly could to get the website to properly run. Even though the video finally gives clarity to their fans of what actually happened on launch day, the scandal portion of the video still remains lackluster. Instead of the unfiltered conversation between Jeffree and Shane about the drama within the Youtube beauty community that the fans wanted and expected, all they received was just Shane and his fiance reacting to the James Charles and Tati Westbrook altercation that happened earlier this year. 

While the documentary itself was not what the fans were particularly expecting, the videos still gained millions of views. The makeup collection was incredibly successful, completely selling out within the first hour of its launch. The controversy behind these two Youtubers makes the Controversy palette and collection one of the most iconic launches in the beauty community, revolutionizing what it means to actually collaborate and build a business within the Youtube community. Although, fans were quite upset by the documentary itself there were moments throughout the series that exposed how other beauty brands, specifically mentioning Too Faced, continue to scam the beauty community out of properly monetizing off of their collaborations. There was also one episode that briefly highlighted the fabrication behind a beauty Youtuber’s lifestyle and why the relationships within that community are considered toxic. As a whole, the launch of the Controversy collection and its documentary goes down in Youtube infamy, and while Shane Dawson and Jeffree Star have done socially unacceptable things, the entire story behind the palette is supposed to show their growth from their past selves and their controversies, which is something the Youtube beauty community desperately needs right now.

 Sierra Joan

@Sierra Swanson

@sierrajoan

@sierrajoan_

@sierrajoan_