R. Kelly no longer has a YouTube channel now that he’s a convicted sex offender.
YouTube permanently suspended two of the singer’s channels after he was found guilty of sex trafficking last week and won’t be allowed to create any new channels moving forward.
YouTube Music, however, will still offer R. Kelly’s channels.
RKellyTV (which had 3.5 million subscribers) and RKellyVevo (which had about 1.6 million subscribers) — were removed on Tuesday citing a violation of its terms of service.
When you try to watch videos on the now-removed channels, a message pops-up that reads, “This video is no longer available because the YouTube account associated with this video has been terminated.”
“Egregious actions committed by R. Kelly warrant penalties beyond standard enforcement measures due to a potential to cause widespread harm,” YouTube VP of legal Nicole Alston wrote in a memo, as reported by Bloomberg. “Ultimately we are taking this action to protect our users similar to other platforms.”
YouTube said it disabled R. Kelly’s channels in accordance with its “creator responsibility guidelines”
That policy prohibits “on- and/or off-platform behavior that we may consider to be inappropriate,” including “intending to cause malicious harm to others” and “participating in abuse or violence, demonstrating cruelty, or participating in fraudulent/deceptive behavior leading to real-world harm.”
