So, YouTuber Madison Beer was “discovered” by Justin Bieber a few years back, and she recently made headlines when audio leaked of her then-boyfriend, fellow YouTuber Jack Gilinsky, berating her with a series of vile insults that everyone was quick to point out constituted emotional abuse.
In a now-deleted post to her fans and followers, Madison Beer spoke out and explained why she stayed with Jack — and issued a warning to her young followers about repeating her mistakes.
When the initial audio recording broke, fans were outraged — and others were worried.
Twitter even through one of its famous over-parties (as in, Jack Gilinsky Is Over).
Jack has since posted a huge apology, because that’s what happens when people find out what sort of person you are.
A lot of people couldn’t understand why Madison stayed with Jack so long.
It’s easy to look at something like that and not understand how it went on.
But only people who’ve been in abusive relationships seem to truly understand.
Madison Beer, however, posted something that should hopefully help others to wrap their heads around why she stayed with Jack.
And no, it wasn’t “because he’s hot.”
There’s no amount of hotness that makes abuse of any kind okay.
Madison is only 18, but her now-deleted words show that she’s grown into a level of wisdom that’s beyond her years:
“This message is for my fans, friends, and people who have sent me so much love and support over these past few days. You guys being here for me has brightened my world more than you can ever know.”
That’s a good, tasteful start.
It’s very likely that not all of Madison’s friends and family had any idea of what was going on.
“Jack and I having to face this yet again has been so hard.”
You might think that Jack would be the only one suffering now that this has come out, but many people who’ve been targets for abuse feel a serious sense of shame.
“Many of you [have been] asking me ‘why would you stay with him if it happened last year?"”
That’s always the question, but Madison does a fairly good job of explaining it.
“My theory was, and as horrible as this is, is that if I left him, he’d do it to the next girl. I tried to fix him.”
That’s how it happens. Love, a desire to fix them, a desire to protect others. It doesn’t work out so well.
“We have both grown and changed so much at this point and it has been an extremely difficult to relive/even go through what you have all heard in the first place and I hope ALL my fans learn from my foolishness.”
We don’t think that it was foolish — just naive.
She doesn’t need to be blaming herself, basically.
“If someone is mistreating you in ANY way please speak up.”
That is such a good message.
Notice how she keeps it vague and isn’t just talking about verbal abuse. We’ll get to that.
“It is NEVER okay and I was blinded by love and much too afraid to come out and say anything in fear I would be broken up with/not taken seriously by someone I told.”
That’s the fear that holds everyone down.
Unfortunately, as we all know from the world’s reaction to Amber Heard, people fearing that they won’t be believed is far too often justified.
People are still defending Johnny Depp after those Amber Heard text messages came out, so yeah.
“SPEAK UP. Don’t make the same mistakes I did, your safety is never worth it. No matter what, nobody deserves to be treated that way. You deserve the world and respect from EVERYONE and ANYONE. Be strong and thank you again.”
The fact that she kept her wording so vague about the nature of her mistreatment, and her use of the word “safety,” could have two meanings.
One could be that she’s just speaking to fans and knows that people go through all kinds of abuse. A lot of her fans are young enough to be abused by parents or teachers.
Some also wonder if she might have been referring to the situation with Jack Gilinsky escalating beyond verbal abuse.
That’s sort of a reach, but the fact that Madison deleted the post only adds fuel to that speculation.
We’re glad that she’s in a better place now.
We’re even gladder that she’s using her horrible experiences to educate her fans.
