Latest / Mini Scroll / Tati’s Sue-nami: How 'Bye Sister' Led to Five Years From Hell For Tati Westbrook

Transcript

Tati’s Sue-nami: How 'Bye Sister' Led to Five Years From Hell For Tati Westbrook · Mini Scroll

• 0:00
  On April 22nd, 2019, beauty YouTube James Charles posted a
• 0:05
  story to Instagram. In the clip, James was promoting
• 0:08
  the sleep vitamins from the popular supplement brand Sugar
• 0:11
  Bear Hair. First of all is so bomb.
• 0:13
  But most importantly I've been dealing with a lot of anxiety
• 0:16
  recently and it always comes late at night when I'm laying in
• 0:18
  bed thinking which is not fun or fresh.
• 0:21
  So I've been taking these 30 minutes before bed and they've
• 0:23
  been really, really helping. James said as he held up the
• 0:26
  bottle with hashtag ad in the corner of the screen.
• 0:29
  Well, sugar hair sponsorships were a dime a dozen amongst
• 0:32
  influencers in the late twenty 10s.
• 0:34
  This particular story by James Charles was about to do
• 0:38
  irreparable damage to his friendship with and the
• 0:41
  reputation of his longtime mentor Tati Westbrook.
• 0:45
  This is the story of how one Instagram post from James
• 0:48
  Charles indirectly led to a five year nightmare for creator Tati
• 0:53
  Westbrook, permanently changing the course of the YouTube beauty
• 0:57
  community and ultimately the course of Internet culture as a
• 1:00
  whole. From Centennial world.
• 1:02
  I'm Lauren Meisner and this is infinite scroll, a podcast about
• 1:06
  Internet culture, the creator economy and how social media is
• 1:09
  shaping Jen said. Welcome back to infinite scroll,
• 1:12
  everyone. I hope you guys have had a great
• 1:15
  week. I am so excited to bring you
• 1:17
  guys this deep dive. I actually think this has been
• 1:19
  the most requested deep dive. So I said like weeks ago, I said
• 1:24
  if you guys want me to do a deep dive into Tati Westbrook and the
• 1:28
  lawsuits that kind of like spun out of by sister.
• 1:31
  They're all like related in this big giant web.
• 1:35
  It's not that one thing necessarily caused another, but
• 1:38
  they're all like tied back somehow.
• 1:41
  Anyways, I asked if you guys wanted a deep dive into that
• 1:43
  because I think I reported on Tati these lawsuit and mini
• 1:46
  scroll like being finally done or something.
• 1:48
  And I cannot tell you how many requests I got for this like so
• 1:52
  many people have asked for it. So here you guys go.
• 1:55
  So as always, Please remember to rate, review and subscribe.
• 1:58
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• 2:01
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• 2:04
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• 2:09
  you can chat with other people who are obsessed with Internet
• 2:11
  culture and drama and T and you guys can chat with me.
• 2:14
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• 2:16
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• 2:20
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  This podcast is incredible. I listen to it while I'm doing
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  chores or baking or just walking my dog or chilling in the house.
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• 2:29
  fully understand Gen. Z terms, trends and current
• 2:32
  events, but you have opened my eyes to these things and pop
• 2:35
  culture at large. Thank you so much Lauren.
• 2:37
  PS We share the same name. Love that.
• 2:39
  Thank you Lauren, I I love being that for you guys about how like
• 2:44
  now you guys can finally like log off social media because you
• 2:48
  know that I will be bringing you everything that you need to know
• 2:51
  or you can like just curate your algorithm to be more positive
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  because I will bring you all of the trends, all of the drama,
• 2:57
  whatever is happening in the creator economy, Internet
• 3:00
  culture trends, social media. Gen.
• 3:02
  ZI got it covered for you guys and Chase Roth 6868 on YouTube
• 3:07
  said love your vids. Hope you grow more and get the
• 3:09
  recognition you deserve. These help me get news about
• 3:11
  influence, celebrities, etcetera I know about but sometimes lack
• 3:15
  the Internet skills to discover on my own.
• 3:17
  So I really appreciate mini scroll and your vids like this.
• 3:20
  Oh my God, that's like what I was just saying.
• 3:21
  Thank you so much Chase. I'm so glad that I can be that
• 3:24
  resource for you. OK before I get into the episode
• 3:26
  I wanted to talk to you guys about the shopping app called
• 3:30
  Carded. So I have seen so many
• 3:32
  influencers that I follow talk about this app and I am
• 3:35
  obsessed. It's like an ultimate wish list
• 3:37
  app. So instead of having a camera
• 3:39
  roll filled with screenshots or a bunch of tabs ABS open of
• 3:42
  things I want to buy, I can save the exact items I want, links
• 3:46
  included, and categorize them into different folders.
• 3:49
  It's almost like Pinterest boards, but specifically for
• 3:51
  things that I am shopping for at the moment.
• 3:54
  So I love to curate my wish list with images and prices, compare
• 3:58
  items, and get notifications when the products I've saved go
• 4:01
  on sale or come back in stock. And my favorite part is that
• 4:04
  Carded lets you share your wish list with friends.
• 4:07
  So this feature is great for gifting, curating an aesthetic
• 4:10
  for a group trip, or just keeping up to date with what's
• 4:13
  trending amongst your friend group.
• 4:14
  I'm about to head on a Europe trip.
• 4:16
  It is a big like hens do all together and my friends and I
• 4:20
  have been curating our outfits for literally months and Carded
• 4:23
  has been so helpful for that. So use the link in the show
• 4:26
  notes below to download Carded. And thank you so much to Carded
• 4:30
  for sponsoring this episode of Infinite Scrolls.
• 4:38
  From Adpocalypse to Tik Tok's rise as the culture driving app,
• 4:42
  Internet culture has seen some defining moments in recent
• 4:45
  years. But there is one event that
• 4:47
  stands out. A moment that I am sure many of
• 4:50
  us remember exactly where we were when it all went down.
• 4:53
  Bye sister. This scandal shook the beauty
• 4:56
  community to its core, ending friendships, exposing the
• 4:59
  realities of influencer culture, and changing the online
• 5:02
  landscape for years to come. Thousands of articles and
• 5:06
  commentary videos have dissected the impact of the scandal on big
• 5:09
  names like James Charles, Shane Dawson, and Jeffrey Star.
• 5:13
  Yet, in my opinion, not enough attention has been paid to the
• 5:17
  woman who set it all in motion, Tati Westbrook, and how this
• 5:21
  infamous video sparked a wave of lawsuits that would alter the
• 5:25
  course of her career. But before we dive into the
• 5:28
  chaos that followed by Sister, let's take a step back and
• 5:31
  contextualize Tati's friendship with the one and only James
• 5:34
  Charles. I'm sure we all remember how
• 5:37
  James rose to viral fame, but for those who might have missed
• 5:39
  it, James came onto the scene in 2015 when he started posting
• 5:43
  makeup content. While James was slowly building
• 5:46
  a following, he skyrocketed to fame when a photo of him
• 5:49
  retaking his senior picture with a ring light went viral at the
• 5:53
  end of the year. He would go on to hit a number
• 5:55
  of career highs, becoming the first male brand ambassador for
• 5:58
  Cover Girl and even appearing on The Ellen Show.
• 6:01
  Parlaying his viral moment into an influencing career, James
• 6:05
  would become known for his colorful makeup tutorials, his
• 6:07
  frequent use of the term sister, and some interesting viral
• 6:11
  moments. Bring Me a Little Water, Sylvie
• 6:13
  and Flashback Mary are just two examples that come to mind.
• 6:17
  He was a key member of the sister squad and was close with
• 6:20
  many other big names in the YouTube space, from Tana Mojo to
• 6:23
  Jeffree Star. However, like many other
• 6:25
  influencers, James has had his fair share of scandals and drama
• 6:29
  with fellow creators. But there was one beauty guru
• 6:32
  who James seemingly always held in high esteem, Tati Westbrook.
• 6:37
  As James climbed the YouTube ranks, Tati became a mentor and
• 6:40
  a mother figure to him. She was a veteran in the
• 6:42
  industry by that point, having started her channel Glam Life
• 6:46
  Guru all the way back in 2010. He contacted me through my DMS
• 6:52
  when he was first starting out. He was 17.
• 6:54
  He was wide eyed and ready to make it on Instagram and social
• 6:59
  media. And, you know, he kind of had
• 7:01
  his YouTube channel going, but not really.
• 7:03
  And you know, the first response I gave him was like, keep up the
• 7:06
  good work or something like that.
• 7:07
  And then he came back and he just has a way of saying the
• 7:11
  most gorgeous things that make you feel so special.
• 7:14
  So he always told me that I was the reason that he wanted to get
• 7:18
  into makeup and I was the reason that he was inspired to start
• 7:22
  his channel and that my channel was one of his favorites.
• 7:25
  And he just loved watching me. And it was just nice to hear, to
• 7:28
  be honest. I was like, wow, like this kid,
• 7:30
  like really. Like, I'm like the grown up
• 7:31
  inspiration like this cool. Like how can I help you?
• 7:34
  Tati frequently promoted his social media collaboration like
• 7:38
  his famed Morphe palette and various other ventures.
• 7:41
  They were so close that James even did her wedding makeup in
• 7:44
  2017. But that would soon all change
• 7:47
  thanks to her vitamin line, Halo Beauty.
• 7:50
  Tati officially announced Halo Beauty on March 1st, 2018 with a
• 7:54
  video titled My Brand Announcement Exos.
• 7:57
  In the video, she explained the meaning behind Halo Beauty's
• 8:00
  name, saying. It means that everyone is
• 8:02
  included, everyone's under the Halo, everyone is thought of,
• 8:06
  and no one is left out. So there is something for
• 8:09
  everyone. It's an all inclusive brand.
• 8:11
  Over the course of the 8 minute and 32nd video, Tati outlined
• 8:15
  her hopes for the brand and introduced the inaugural
• 8:17
  product, the Hair, Skin and Nails Booster, a vitamin
• 8:20
  supplement formulated to nourish and strengthen everything from
• 8:23
  hair to nails. According to Brussels reporting
• 8:26
  at the time, the supplements were priced at 3995 for a 30 day
• 8:30
  supply. There were 60 capsules per
• 8:32
  bottle and Tati recommended taking two per day.
• 8:35
  In the announcement video, Tati emphasized the products
• 8:38
  efficacy. Everything that we have put
• 8:39
  together works together very safely.
• 8:41
  Everything works together in harmony to really improve
• 8:45
  everything with the way you look from your hair to your nails to
• 8:49
  your skin. This is magic right here.
• 8:52
  But the kind of magic that isn't just in your head, it actually
• 8:56
  does work. Tati also mentioned that this
• 8:58
  was just the beginning, hinting at her future plans for the
• 9:00
  company saying. I have a lot in mind with where
• 9:03
  I want to go. However, like many beauty
• 9:06
  supplements, the launch of Halo Beauty was met with skepticism.
• 9:09
  Scrolling through the comments left under the announcement
• 9:12
  video of the time, many users expressed disappointment and
• 9:15
  Tati's decision to go down this route, with some even likening
• 9:18
  the supplements to a scam. While concern and skepticism is
• 9:21
  valid, it is worth noting that a fair share of these comments did
• 9:25
  sway into the hateful territory. Nevertheless, others were
• 9:28
  frustrated that Tati didn't release conventional skin care
• 9:31
  or makeup products, given that these products were the reason
• 9:34
  that many of her viewers trusted her and looked to her for
• 9:37
  recommending quote. This is the most vague video
• 9:41
  I've ever seen in my life. You have more descriptive videos
• 9:44
  on chapstick than you do your own product, one viewer wrote.
• 9:47
  Where are the before and afters, especially on yourself?
• 9:50
  There are beauty gurus out here who make videos about the
• 9:52
  journey they've gone on through collaborations with other
• 9:55
  companies, let alone their own product.
• 9:57
  I don't understand this at all. In response to the backlash,
• 10:01
  Tati posted a follow up video titled Responding to Questions,
• 10:04
  Concerns and Accusations, aiming to address the concerns her
• 10:07
  viewers had raised. While the video was better
• 10:10
  received than the initial announcement, many of her
• 10:12
  viewers were not exactly convinced.
• 10:15
  I'm going to keep working and I am going to bring other products
• 10:18
  out that go from skin care to color cosmetics and more
• 10:22
  vitamins. Now, Tati did go on to release
• 10:24
  other beauty products beyond her vitamins, but they didn't fall
• 10:28
  under the Halo Beauty brand. In October 2019, for instance,
• 10:32
  she announced the launch of Tati Beauty via her YouTube channel
• 10:35
  and introduced the Textured Neutrals Eyeshadow Palette
• 10:39
  Volume one. Halo Beauty did release other
• 10:42
  products beyond the initial Booster vitamins, but the brand
• 10:44
  also became notorious as the catalyst behind the infamous By
• 10:49
  Sister scandal. Before By Sister completely
• 10:52
  derailed the Internet, the beauty community was booming.
• 10:55
  James Charles was set to launch his Morphe palette, and brand
• 10:58
  trips were all the rage. But that's not to say it had all
• 11:02
  been smooth sailing. Drama had already left its mark.
• 11:05
  Drama Get in One blew up just a year early, marking the downfall
• 11:09
  of one of the beauty community's most famous friend groups,
• 11:12
  Jeffree Star Manny mua, Laura Lee and Nikita Dragon.
• 11:16
  The cracks in their friendship had started showing in 2017, but
• 11:19
  it wasn't until 2018 that things truly imploded.
• 11:23
  Soon after YouTube Shane Dawson released his docu series The
• 11:26
  Secret World of Jeffree. Star beauty guru Gabriel Zamora
• 11:30
  posted a photo with Manny, Laura and Nikita on Twitter.
• 11:33
  The group was flipping off the camera with the caption Bitch is
• 11:36
  bitter because without him we're doing, Which fans quickly
• 11:40
  realized was a dig at Jeffrey star.
• 11:42
  Gabriel also started making public remarks about Jeffrey's
• 11:45
  racist history, which only led to loyal Jeffrey fans starting
• 11:49
  to dig through the archives. Old tweets from Manny, Laura,
• 11:52
  and Nikita soon resurfaced, with many of them being racist.
• 11:56
  This was one of the first times fans saw the beauty community's
• 11:59
  darker side, leading to the general decline in interest as
• 12:02
  audiences felt betrayed by the creators they had supported with
• 12:06
  their time and money for years. Though many of his counterparts
• 12:09
  were plagued with scandal, James Charles was at the height of his
• 12:12
  career following the launch of his Morphe collaboration in
• 12:15
  November 2018. The collaboration became the
• 12:18
  brand's of best selling palette all year, selling out four times
• 12:21
  worldwide and inspiring a second James Charles X Morphe Artistry
• 12:25
  Palette, a mini version of the original.
• 12:28
  Then, on May 11th, 2019, James's career came crashing down
• 12:33
  overnight. While on tour in Australia, the
• 12:36
  beauty goober woke up to a 43 3 minute video posted by his
• 12:40
  friend and mentor Tati, titled by Sister.
• 12:44
  In the video, Tati made several accusations, including claims
• 12:48
  that James was disloyal and money hungry.
• 12:50
  This came on the heels of a series of Instagram stories she
• 12:53
  had posted previously where she spoke about feeling used and
• 12:56
  betrayed. Social media sleuths quickly
• 12:59
  pieced together that she was referring to James, who had
• 13:01
  recently posted that Instagram story promoting Sugar Bear hair
• 13:05
  that I mentioned in the intro. That story was in exchange for
• 13:09
  Coachella artist passes. Sugar Bear Hair, a company that
• 13:13
  sells vitamins and supplements, was a direct competitor to
• 13:16
  Tati's Halo Beauty. Aside from these claims of
• 13:19
  betrayal, Tati also accused the then teenager of using his fame
• 13:24
  to manipulate straight men into sexual relationships.
• 13:27
  While most of the Internet initially sided with Tati, some
• 13:30
  users found this accusation to be homophobic and also just kind
• 13:35
  of weird given the age gap between Tati and James.
• 13:38
  Jeffree Star defended Toddy's claims.
• 13:40
  Incense deleted tweets calling James a quote danger to society.
• 13:45
  Almost immediately. James lost millions of
• 13:47
  followers, 2.6 million subscribers in three days to be
• 13:51
  exact, and several sponsorship deals including his
• 13:54
  manufacturing partnership for Sisters Apparel with Jeffree
• 13:56
  Star's company Killer Merch. Multiple boys came forward
• 14:00
  claiming James had tried to groom them and quote UN quote
• 14:02
  turn them gay. The Internet was calling him a
• 14:05
  predator and the feud made mainstream news around the
• 14:08
  world. James posted two response
• 14:10
  videos. The first title, Tati, was an 8
• 14:14
  minute clip where James, nearly in tears, apologized to Tati and
• 14:17
  her husband for everything that happened.
• 14:20
  The video didn't go over well, with many people finding it
• 14:23
  inauthentic and leading him to eventually delete it.
• 14:27
  His second video, however, titled No More Lies change the
• 14:31
  course of the scandal. To date, it is still the most
• 14:34
  viewed video on his channel, currently sitting at 57 million
• 14:38
  views. News In the video, James sets
• 14:40
  the record straight, saying that Tati's accusations hurt him
• 14:44
  deeply. He apologized for promoting her
• 14:46
  competitors product and addressed her claims about his
• 14:49
  alleged behavior. First of all, I'm a 19 year old
• 14:52
  virgin. I have never and will never use
• 14:55
  my fame, money or power to manipulate or get any sexual
• 14:59
  actions from a guy. That is disgusting.
• 15:02
  It is not me. For contacts, this video and
• 15:05
  this whole scandal was also before any allegations
• 15:08
  circulating about James, quote UN quote grooming and soliciting
• 15:11
  racy photos from minors. After providing receipts that
• 15:15
  seemingly debunked many of Tati's claims, the narrative had
• 15:18
  shifted within a matter of hours.
• 15:20
  The Internet turned on Tati for going after a teenager while she
• 15:23
  was in her 30s without providing proof of her claims.
• 15:27
  James had regained public support and six months after the
• 15:30
  scandal, James was back on top. His subscriber count had nearly
• 15:33
  recovered. He had entered into a new
• 15:35
  manufacturing deal for Sisters Apparel and during during an
• 15:38
  interview with WWD, he teased plans for his own beauty brand.
• 15:43
  Tati, however, took a hiatus from the Internet about a year
• 15:47
  later. In June 2020, she posted a
• 15:49
  follow up video to buy Sister titled Breaking My Silence.
• 15:52
  In it, she discussed her history with James alongside her
• 15:56
  friendship with Jeffree Star. Notably, Tati accused Jeffrey
• 16:00
  and Shane Dawson of being the puppet masters behind the
• 16:03
  attempt to take down James, claiming she was manipulated and
• 16:07
  gas lit into believing lies about the then 19 year olds.
• 16:10
  She said she was coerced into making her initial expose,
• 16:13
  expressing regret over how everything unfolded.
• 16:16
  The video has since been deleted.
• 16:18
  In June 2021, she posted another 19 minute video addressing the
• 16:23
  scandal, titled A year Later, Tati explained why she had spent
• 16:27
  some time offline. The beauty guru started by
• 16:29
  announcing that she had not spoken to anyone in the beauty
• 16:32
  community since quote UN quote, breaking her silence in June
• 16:35
  2020, she claimed she needed to step away from from YouTube in
• 16:39
  order to move forward as she was going through a very challenging
• 16:42
  time personally. When she made that video a year
• 16:45
  later also marked the first time Tati addressed a major life
• 16:49
  event on her YouTube channel, a series of massive lawsuits
• 16:53
  brought to her by her Halo Beauty business partner.
• 16:56
  This whole thing has since become known to beauty community
• 16:59
  enthusiasts as the Tsunami. It all started in October 2020
• 17:04
  when a man named Clark Swanson filed a complaint in Los Angeles
• 17:08
  against Tati and her husband James Westbrook.
• 17:11
  Now we're not a legal podcast so I won't dive into the nitty
• 17:15
  gritty of the claims from a legal perspective.
• 17:18
  But what I can do is explain how this lawsuit shifted the
• 17:21
  collective's perspective of by sister for contacts.
• 17:25
  Clark Swanson was a Co founder of Halo Beauty and also James
• 17:28
  Westbrook's longtime colleague and friend.
• 17:31
  In the lawsuit, Clark claims that there was initially a 5050
• 17:34
  split of the brand, with the Westbrooks owning 25% each.
• 17:38
  However, they later approached him with a deal offering 2/3 of
• 17:42
  the business in exchange for Tati committing to launching any
• 17:45
  future cosmetics line under the Halo Beauty umbrella.
• 17:49
  So when Tati launched Tati Beauty separately, Clark took
• 17:53
  issue with it, which led him to sue the couple Tati Cosmetics,
• 17:57
  which was Tati Beauty's parent company, and Halo Beauty for
• 18:01
  breach of fiduciary duty, fraud, negligence, and other claims.
• 18:06
  Given the success of Tati Beauty's first shadow palette,
• 18:09
  Clark claimed he was shut out from what he estimated would
• 18:12
  have been a $16,000,000 profit from the initial launch.
• 18:16
  The filing also alleged that James Westbrook liquidated quote
• 18:20
  hundreds of thousands of dollars in Halo Beauty assets on October
• 18:24
  10th, 2020 after learning of the lawsuit attempting to decrease
• 18:28
  the company's value. The news broke the following
• 18:31
  month in mainstream media, with the likes of BuzzFeed, E-news,
• 18:34
  and Paper Magazine covering the lawsuit from here.
• 18:38
  Social media sleuths and creators quickly picked up on
• 18:41
  the story, with many reading the legal findings themselves and
• 18:44
  creating commentary videos. The lawsuit seemed particularly
• 18:47
  petty with the opening line reading.
• 18:50
  This is a lawsuit caused by the defendant's greed.
• 18:53
  The lawsuit also revealed that the Westbrooks had previously
• 18:56
  faced personal bankruptcy, which led to Halo Beauty to rely on
• 19:00
  Clark's line of credit. Beyond these claims, Clark's
• 19:03
  legal team also included seemingly unnecessary details
• 19:07
  about the beauty community that caught the attention of sleuths
• 19:10
  online. For example, the filing alleged
• 19:13
  that in 2017, Tati quote, touted her clique as sources of
• 19:17
  promotion for Halo Beauty, and she used this influence to
• 19:20
  convince Clark to give up equity in the business.
• 19:23
  But of course, we all know that this promise was undermined when
• 19:27
  James Charles promoted Sugar Bear Hair, a direct competitor.
• 19:30
  Quote, she told Mr. Swanson that her friends were among the most
• 19:34
  influential on YouTube and that they would cross promote her
• 19:37
  products. She released that some of them
• 19:39
  like Jeffrey Star, Manny Mua, James Charles and Laura Lee were
• 19:43
  launching or preparing to launch their own cosmetics lines.
• 19:46
  According to Mr. Westbrook, those YouTube influencers would
• 19:49
  look to Miss Westbrook to endorse their products, which
• 19:52
  she would. In turn, she could expect them
• 19:55
  to endorse Miss Westbrook's products, the October 2020
• 19:58
  filing reads. On top of this, the filing
• 20:01
  revealed that Jeffrey Star allegedly told Tati that Sugar
• 20:04
  Bear Hair offered him a massive 200,000.
• 20:08
  For a promotional video on his social media quote, Miss
• 20:12
  Westbrook told Mr. Swanson she asked these influencers not to
• 20:15
  endorse Sugar Bear hair because she was launching a competing
• 20:18
  hair, skin and nails vitamin. She informed Mr. Swanson that
• 20:22
  all the influencers turned down the Sugar Bear hair offer.
• 20:25
  So this context sheds new light on why Tati may have gone so
• 20:30
  hard during the BI sister scandal, as pointed out by Katie
• 20:33
  Joy from the YouTube channel Without a Crystal Ball, who was
• 20:36
  the first YouTube to cover the loss suit.
• 20:38
  James's decision to promote Sugar Bear Hair wasn't just a
• 20:42
  personal betrayal, it also seemingly undermined Tati's
• 20:45
  business commitments and promises to the cofounders of
• 20:49
  Halo Beauty. Many have reflected on Tati's
• 20:51
  words in the original by Sister video where she directly
• 20:54
  addressed James. You know what happened, you know
• 20:57
  about the coordinated event that happened.
• 20:59
  You were with me. You know what I went through to
• 21:01
  bring everything to life? The risk involved in going into
• 21:04
  a category that no one wants to get into.
• 21:06
  So when you pair up with my number one competitor, it's
• 21:10
  embarrassing to me. With this hindsight, YouTube
• 21:13
  news channels and fans quickly speculated that perhaps James
• 21:16
  Charles was Privy to the deal that Tati and her husband made
• 21:20
  with Clark Swanson. Therefore, when James promoted
• 21:22
  Sugar Bear Hair to his millions of followers, this put Tati in a
• 21:26
  very bad position with her business partner and their
• 21:30
  contract. Now keep in mind that even if he
• 21:32
  was Privy to these business dealings, James Charles was
• 21:37
  still a teenager at this point. If all of this was Tati's actual
• 21:42
  motivation for making by Sister, that led to even more questions
• 21:46
  around the validity of Tati's claims.
• 21:48
  Maybe Tati wasn't actually manipulated and gas lit by Shane
• 21:53
  Dawson and Jeffrey Star to take down James Charles, as she
• 21:56
  claimed in her follow up video Breaking My Silence.
• 22:00
  Amidst all of this, Tati and her husband James filed their own
• 22:04
  lawsuit against Katie Joy, the creator behind the drama channel
• 22:07
  Without A Crystal, who first reported on the Clark Swanson
• 22:10
  lawsuit. The Westbrooks had reportedly
• 22:12
  sent Katie for cease and desist, telling her to stop discussing
• 22:16
  them on her channel, and when she failed to do so, they filed.
• 22:20
  In October 2020, the Westbrooks filed a lawsuit against Katie
• 22:23
  over emotional distress and defamation relating to how Katie
• 22:26
  reported on the Clark Swanson lawsuit.
• 22:29
  The Westbrook's lawsuit against Katie listed at least 114
• 22:32
  instances of her allegedly quote stating her negative opinions
• 22:36
  about Tati and James as fact during her on air segments.
• 22:40
  For example, Katie allegedly said in her now deleted video
• 22:43
  that Chati destroyed James Charles's career and cost him
• 22:47
  millions of dollars, which Chati said was a lie.
• 22:50
  The lawsuit ended up settling out of court, but in a follow up
• 22:53
  video, Katie said that during her proceedings with the
• 22:56
  Westbrooks, she apparently learned that she was being fed
• 23:00
  information from unreliable sources who were trying to take
• 23:04
  down the Westbrooks. Now, going back to Clark
• 23:07
  Swanson's lawsuit against the Westbrook's, it wasn't long
• 23:10
  before the couple issued their own legal response to Clark.
• 23:13
  YouTube commentary creator Emily D Baker obtained a 188 page
• 23:18
  document via the Westbrook's legal team, and in it, Tati and
• 23:22
  her husband James provided a detailed account of their
• 23:25
  business relations with Clark Swanson, including screenshots,
• 23:28
  photos and emails as evidence. The video where Emily initially
• 23:31
  reported on the filing has since been deleted.
• 23:34
  According to the Westbrook's lawyers, many of Clark's
• 23:37
  allegations were false and contradicted by documents they
• 23:40
  have provided. Amongst the alleged false
• 23:42
  allegations, they claimed that Clark was to provide half of the
• 23:45
  necessary capital to build Halo Beauty as well as oversee the
• 23:49
  day-to-day operations in exchange for 50% equity.
• 23:53
  The Westbrooks alleged that the partnership restructured because
• 23:56
  Clark repeatedly failed to perform his duties.
• 23:59
  They claimed he borrowed half of the initial $200,000 investment
• 24:03
  behind the Westbrooks back. They also alleged that Clark did
• 24:06
  multiple shady things with their business business accounts,
• 24:09
  which led them to question if he had a secret business partner
• 24:12
  involved. They said he lied to them about
• 24:14
  his success as an entrepreneur and he frequently cut corners.
• 24:18
  In a very bizarre claim, the Westbrook's allege that Clark's
• 24:21
  brother emailed them, quote, asserting that Mister Swanson
• 24:25
  had created a fictitious online persona impersonating the
• 24:28
  Westbrook's personal assistant. They detailed interactions that
• 24:32
  Clark had with Jeffrey Star, which quote UN quote embarrassed
• 24:35
  Tati and claimed he was condescending to and inapproach
• 24:38
  appropriate with the Westbrooks female staff.
• 24:40
  Finally, the document addressed Clark's claim that Chatty
• 24:43
  promised to use Halo Beauty as the umbrella for all her beauty
• 24:47
  launches. Quote.
• 24:48
  The August 15th, 2017 resolutions make clear that the
• 24:52
  Westbrooks can conduct business outside of Halo Beauty as long
• 24:55
  as it does not compete with nutraceuticals, their statement
• 24:59
  read. Over the next four years,
• 25:01
  multiple lawsuits were filed with the Westbrooks, ending up
• 25:04
  dealing with lawsuits across multiple states, namely
• 25:07
  California, Washington, Washington, and Nevada.
• 25:09
  While the majority of these had to do with Halo Beauty directly,
• 25:12
  Clark's legal team filed a complaint alleging that the
• 25:15
  Westbrooks had defamed him. Ultimately, the back and forth
• 25:19
  litigation was part of the reason that Chatty Beauty
• 25:22
  shuttered in 2021. In a video titled Why I'm
• 25:25
  Closing Chatty Beauty, Chatty opened up to fans saying that
• 25:28
  the brand had closed its doors partly because of the pandemic
• 25:31
  and partly because of litigation that she's been involved with
• 25:34
  over the past year. COVID.
• 25:36
  Hit and that definitely slowed things down.
• 25:38
  It slowed the whole world down. And then of course, you guys are
• 25:41
  aware of the outside litigation that really impacted my life in
• 25:46
  full. Tati had previously spoken
• 25:48
  openly about how the legal battle has impacted her life,
• 25:51
  forcing her to downsize by selling her LA home and
• 25:54
  relocating back to Seattle. She also claimed it caused a
• 25:57
  major strain on her marriage. This whole experience has felt
• 26:01
  quite a bit silencing like it just has because you're so
• 26:05
  afraid of saying something that could then start another
• 26:09
  lawsuit. Because I have now, in the past
• 26:12
  three years, I have been sued by the same person in four states.
• 26:19
  I have not gone online and cried about it and complained about it
• 26:23
  or talked much about it at all. I've just wanted to be strong,
• 26:26
  move through it. And here we are about three
• 26:29
  years later and it's just been this ongoing, never ending.
• 26:34
  If I move I get my hand slapped, kind of a feel.
• 26:37
  Tati said in one video from September 2023.
• 26:40
  While Tati didn't necessarily go into the details of the outside
• 26:44
  litigation in her videos over the years, viewers did know that
• 26:47
  the lawsuits were headed to a trial where many were concerned
• 26:50
  about how it would play out for her.
• 26:52
  Obviously, she had to stay relatively tight lipped about it
• 26:55
  all, including when the lawsuits were all finally settled earlier
• 26:58
  this month. On August 1st, 2024, Tati took
• 27:01
  to her YouTube channel to announce that the legal battle
• 27:04
  had finally come to an end. In the video, she announced that
• 27:08
  all the the parties had come to a settlement.
• 27:10
  In the end, Tati and her husband will be moving on from Halo
• 27:13
  Beauty and she plans to relaunch her makeup brand, Tati Beauty.
• 27:17
  I fought this long and hard to have access to create brands
• 27:21
  again because I couldn't before. I now have full use of my name
• 27:26
  and I can create whatever without it being in the middle
• 27:29
  of litigation and fighting over who gets what.
• 27:32
  In the video, she talked about her love of making products from
• 27:35
  makeup to merge to fragrance, and expressed her appreciation
• 27:38
  for the opportunities that she can now pursue.
• 27:41
  She also noted that moving forward, she doesn't plan to
• 27:44
  include outside business partners in these brands, which
• 27:47
  isn't entirely surprising given how everything has gone down
• 27:51
  with Halo Beauty over the past four years.
• 27:53
  So that is officially the story of how one Instagram post from
• 27:58
  19 year old James Charles promoting Sugar Bear hair in
• 28:01
  exchange for Coachella artist passes unknowingly kicked off
• 28:05
  five years of legal battles, closed businesses, and damaged
• 28:09
  reputations for Tati and James Westbrook.
• 28:13
  Infinite Scroll is a podcast produced, presented and Co
• 28:16
  written by me, Lauren Meissner for Centennial World.
• 28:19
  This episode was researched and Co written by Annabelle and
• 28:22
  David and edited by Danny Fennick.
• 28:25
  Thank you guys so much for listening.
• 28:26
  I love you guys and I will talk to you next week.
• 28:29
  Bye.