Last updated: July 3rd, 2023
KodeeRants, a drama channel and longtime follower of viral culture, has come forward about their experience as a Colleen Ballinger fan.
After a nearly four-month hiatus from the internet, Kodee uploaded a video titled “why I left the colleen ballinger fandom…” on their YouTube channel. In this nearly 30-minute video, Kodee broke down the dynamics of the fandom— discussing their parasocial relationship with Colleen and how this bond prevented them from recognising the influencer’s problematic behaviour.
Note: Kodee removed all content from their channel following a video by commentary creator Dustin Dailey who called them out for also being in Colleen fandom group chats with minors (something Kodee did address in their original video). Kodee has since reposted the video, adding an apology in the description box for their behaviour and their decision to withhold evidence about Colleen’s alleged manipulation for years.
“I privated the video due to the backlash I was getting on it when I should have just left it up in the first place because it helped validate what happened to Adam [McIntyre] in 2020. But unfortunately, I was too much of a coward to do so. I want to do the right thing and repost it,” they write in a community post. “I am sorry for making this story about me when it never was about me. I am sorry for crying, screaming, and trying to paint myself as a victim. I was never a victim. I was an adult who should have known better.”
Kodee begins the video by explaining how they became a fan of Colleen in the first place, saying, “I joined her fandom after I made a video making fun of Colleen and her outfit choices… Colleen quote tweeted it [the video]… and then a lot of her fans started following me, and that is where my Twitter lifespan started.”
Having gained a following on Twitter, Kodee soon became a prominent member of the fandom — joining Twitter group chats and building relationships with Colleen’s close circle of friends and family.
However, as Kodee reveals, the fandom’s culture proved to be highly toxic.
Fandom Group Chats
In their video, Kodee sheds light on the disturbing nature of Twitter group chats within the fandom. They emphasise that these groups were often comprised of both minors and adults, creating an inappropriate environment for many young people involved.
“I did not know, at the time, that there were minors in these group chats, which I should have done the research on, so I want to apologise to any child who was in these group chats,” they admit. “[As an adult], I should not have been in a group chat with you.”
Having said that, Kodee explains how certain fans bullied them while also exploiting them to manipulate their way into Colleen’s inner circle of followers. Kodee gives a specific example, where they were added to a group chat for a Miranda Sings show in Cleveland, Ohio, with fellow attendees. They recount how they faced “hate” from the group members before joining the chat. But, after Kodee went viral for a Tanacon rant and was featured in a PewDiePie video, the same group chat members began reaching out to them, hoping to establish a friendship.
“It did cause me a little bit of trauma because it made me feel like I couldn’t trust anyone. It really hurt my feelings that people would do this. They could be nice to me but then like talk about me in group chats and try to be my friend just so they can get attention,” they reflect.
Unfortunately, Kodee’s encounters in these Twitter chats are not even the most unsettling experiences within the fandom. For example, Kodee shared a screenshot from a group chat called “the weenies” that included Colleen and some of her followers. In the text thread, Colleen asks a fan (who was a minor at the time), “Are you a virgin?” and “What’s your favourite position?” after he asks the group chat to send in questions for a Q&A.
The fan was soon revealed to be Adam McIntyre, a Twitter-famous follower of Colleen who would later become entangled in one of her most controversial moments.
The Adam McIntyre Situation
While Adam was known for being a fan of Colleen, he also built a following covering viral news and pop culture on his YouTube channel. And three years ago, Adam went viral after he revealed his experiences being a part of the fandom and getting close to Colleen in a video titled, “colleen ballinger, stop lying.” Today, the video sits at 1.7 million views.
In the nearly 25-minute video, Adam exposed Colleen for how she treated him during their friendship, claiming she exploited his love for her and the Miranda Sings character.
He explains that Colleen placed significant pressure on him professionally and personally over the years. Adam had “ghost-written” content for Miranda’s social media pages (some of which received backlash), given Colleen video ideas and even talked with the creator about her failed marriage with Joshua David Evans. And to make matters worse, Colleen first formed a friendship with Adam when he was 13 years old, while she was in her early 30s.
In the video, Adam also recalls when Colleen and her best friend, Kory DeSoto, sent him lingerie after he tweeted them during a live stream.
“Looking back as a 17-year-old, I’m just really disgusted by the situation… That was a big warning sign,” Adam says in his YouTube video. “Whenever it [the lingerie] arrived, my parents were furious. They were so angry, and they took it away.”
Colleen later posted a video titled, “addressing everything”, responding to Adam’s claims and explaining her side of the story. She reveals that she took time to respond to Adam’s video because she “received a message from this person’s mother asking me not to speak his name. I was trying to respect the mother’s wishes.”
Nevertheless, she goes on to address the concerns around her sending lingerie to a minor.
“I sent a child underwear…And wow, anyone who heard this out of context and was offended, I completely understand because I would be, too. But in this situation, context is everything,” she begins. “[I’ve] always given away weird stuff, and so in my mind at the time, this was no different than all the other weird stuff I’ve sent to my fans as a joke.”
While she emphasises the underwear was unworn, “in hindsight, I see how completely stupid [it was] of me… I should have never sent that,” she concedes.
Considering the claims in Adam’s video, many social media users remained concerned about his friendship with Colleen. However, many fans continued to come to her defence— one of them being Kodee.
Kodee’s Response To Adam
In their recent video, Kodee explained their involvement in the “Adam McIntyre situation.” At the time of the scandal, they uploaded two videos. The initial video supported Colleen, whereas the second took on a more critical perspective and highlighted Colleen’s history of problematic comments and posts.
Kodee provided insight into their shifting perspective in the new video. They explained that before Colleen made her apology video, she had reached out to Kodee privately.
“I wanted to reach out to you privately and in confidence and let you know why I’m staying silent. After he sent me that last message that he has now made public, I responded to his messages immediately (did not ghost him) and then received a message from his mother through his DMs asking me to not speak of him,” Colleen’s DM to Kodee reads. “I realise now I should have never been communicating with him in the first place. However, he is lying about a lot and showing things out of context and will get major backlash if I were to expose that. But I am trying my best to respect his family’s wishes and protect him, as a minor, as best I can. I am sad and disappointed about all of this, and I’m just trying to keep it together rn.”
Kodee goes on to share that they “think Colleen messaged me so I would do her dirty work for her and tried to get me on her side.” After receiving Colleen’s DM and messages from people within her circle, like Kory, Kodee chose to defend the content creator from Adam’s claims in the first video.
“I had a parasocial relationship with her. I was going to say whatever I could to make her think I was on her side because I wanted her to like me,” they explain. “You can’t tell me that this wasn’t a strategy… they were trying to get me to make the video so they could see the backlash that I would get with talking badly about Adam, so they knew what they could talk about.”
Kodee alleges that manipulation continued even after they posted their second, more critical, video about Colleen. The influencer messaged them privately, writing, “I’m proud of you for making your most recent video. I’m sure that was difficult. I am so so sorry that my disgusting words from the past hurt you.” After this DM, Colleen never spoke with Kodee again.
“I feel like I was really traumatised and used by Colleen and Kory. I never should have made that first video,” they conclude. “I’m much happier now that I’m not in the fandom.”
Adam Reacts To Kodee’s Video
After being “pinned as a liar” for the last three years, Adam has spoken out again and reacted to Kodee’s video on live. Posting the stream to his channel with the title, “i was right about colleen ballinger,” he shares that Kodee is the first person to publicly validate his experience. He even extended an invitation for them to join the stream.
“Basically, it has been confirmed that Colleen was orchestrating everything, through this person Kodee, to try take me down because she didn’t want me having a voice,” he begins.
Adam goes on to note that Kodee wasn’t the only person Colleen allegedly reached out to in order to debunk his claims. He recalls that YouTubers like James Charles also came forward to defend the content creator.
“She got James Charles to publicly go on the record saying that I was a liar and that I was a little bitch and that I was a manipulative person- this 17-year-old, by the way, was manipulating this 30-year-old,” he reflects.
Adam also corroborates Kodee’s screenshots of Colleen’s inappropriate messages to minors, sharing that these texts only prove that she was willing to engage in conversations with him about her personal life.
“She asked me what my favourite sex position is,” he says. “Now, if that doesn’t validate any of the stories that she would be talking openly about her sex with her ex-husband to me, then I don’t know what will.”
With this in mind, Adam claims that Colleen perpetuates a toxic environment within the fandom, where viewers would bully her ex-husband, ex-friends and even other fans.
“For anyone who’s a fan of Colleen Ballinger… they make fun of you [behind the scenes], they make fun of your appearance, they make fun of things you do, and I know because I was also with them doing it except one group of us were in our 30s one group of us had not even hit the ripe age of 15 yet,” he explains.
This culture, Adam notes, is why he holds “nothing against Kodee,” even though their video led to him “[losing] every single person that I was friends with for years.”
“Kodee was done the same way I was, except I was used to going against her [Colleen’s] ex-husband or to go against her ex-friends… Kodee was used to go against me,” Adam goes on to say. “Kodee is equally a victim here. There are victims of Colleen’s mental abuse, and yes, I never said it in my first video, but I’ll say it now as a 20-year-old Colleen Ballinger grooms her fans, emotionally grooms her fans for her own benefit.”
Following the release of Kodee’s video, numerous social media users have stepped up to support Adam, with pop culture journalist Kat Tenbarge emerging as a prominent advocate. In a Twitter thread, she notes that these parasocial connections are “ripe for abuse,” with “nothing equal about the relationship.”
“Adam was on the receiving end of an adult celebrity YouTuber’s abusive smear campaign as a child and thousands of her fans/sympathisers (other grown adults mind you) piled on… I’m so proud of him for speaking out, which is terrifying & traumatic to do,” she writes.
The allegations against Colleen and the Ballinger family have snowballed since Kodee reignited the discourse around their problematic behaviour. For instance, a fan named Becky has shared how she felt “sexually violated” when Colleen pulled her up on stage in an audience-participation segment during a Miranda Sings show. Meanwhile, another fan named Ollie accused Colleen’s brother, Trent Ballinger, of sending inappropriate messages to them when they were 13-14 years old.
Almost a month after Kodee posted their initial video, Colleen addressed the allegations through a song on her YouTube channel. She strummed a ukulele and sang her “apology” for 10 minutes, mocking the situation while avoiding taking accountability for the inappropriate relationships she fostered with fans over the years. However, in her response video, she did not address the allegations against her brother or her best friend, Kory.