Popular music vlogger Anthony Fantano – best known for his YouTube channel The Needle Drop – has been accused of promoting alt-right sentiment on a separate, lesser-known channel.
Fantano’s eminently popular The Needle Drop channel regularly posts album reviews on YouTube, and has gained over 1.1 million subscribers and 260+ million views since its launch in 2007.
Now, the vlogger has been accused of ‘pandering’ to the alt-right on a lesser-known side channel. As The Fader reports, Fantano’s side-channel thatistheplan is centred on language typically associated with the far-right movement, with videos titled “pepe the frog triggers hillary clinton,” “I CHANGED MY GENDER CUZ DONALD TRUMP,” and “MEGA-CUCK SAYS POKEMON GO IS LIKE DOGFIGHTING” gaining Fantano’s secret second account over 400,000 subscribers. His videos also targets ‘SJWs’ and feminists, and repeatedly belittle the work of black musicians.
The Fader also report that, as of yesterday (October 3), Fantano has deleted all videos off thatistheplan, replacing it instead with a 30-second clip of YouTube’s monetisation logo in protest to the site’s ban on profit-making from inappropriate videos. As Fader writer Ezra Marcus states: “With the content offline, the discussion moves away from content to center [sic] around free speech and the rights of creators. It’s a savvy move.”
Fantano reportedly deleted the entire channel after being approached for comment by The Fader. “i’m a youtuber, so i’m going to respond to it in a video,” he later Tweeted after being questioned on his lack of response.
