Filipino TikToker Umi Chii has come under fire from netizens for a whole list of reasons, including being racist against her own race, trying to appear Japanese, and acting like a child to ‘bait pedophiles’, amongst other things.
The 19-year-old, who has over 445K followers on TikTok, is known for her ‘cyberdoll aesthetic’, a style that is characterised by pale skin and large exaggerated doll-like features.
She dresses like a Japanese schoolgirl and often posts ‘tutorials’ on editing her image to look more doll-like.
A Google doc, which has since been removed, detailed all of the allegations against Umi Chii. She was criticised for East-Asian fishing, basically trying to be an East-Asian person, and in her case Japanese, and speaking in English with a Japanese accent.
She was also accused of supporting incest, having posted about wanting to cosplay as an anime character who is in love with her brother.
Some also pointed out that she dressed like a Japanese schoolgirl and “acts like a child” in order to bait pedophiles.
Her appearance and behaviour led many to believe that she disregards and hates her own race.
In one of her old Facebook posts, Umi Chii wrote: “I realise I’ve likely always used my being fluent in English as a protective means to self-isolate from the cruel illiterate inbred phenotype of Filipinos, and as a supplement to finding genuinely kind people without brains the size of a cashew.”
Earlier this week, Umi Chii posted a YouTube video addressing the controversy.
She also wrote a long blog post, breaking down each of the accusations and providing explanations for her choice of aesthetics, behaviour, and “hate speech”.
You can read her full post here.
TL;DR: She claims that she had no intention of East-Asian baiting and attributes her appearance to a preference in style.
She also refuted the accusations of “supporting incest” and “pedo-baiting”, adding that she is “not ‘pretending’ to look younger” and happens to have “neotenous”, or juvenile, features.
She claimed that she is proud of telling others she is fully Filipino, and her race has been included in her page’s bio since the beginning.
She also said that her negative commentary about Filipinos was taken out of context as she was only referring to a certain group of people instead of the entire race.
As for speaking in Japanese-accented English, she explains that she uses a method called “shadowing” in order to improve her pronunciation, listening, comprehension, and fluency in the language.
Despite all that, netizens are not buying her reasons. They said her video seemed like she was just “trying to hit the word count” and insisted that she simply refuses to admit she wishes to be of another race.
They also noted that while she asked for “constructive criticism” in her video, she was only liking comments that supported her.
However, there are also some netizens who feel Umi Chii is getting cyberbullied.
According to Umi Chii, she suffered a severe anxiety attack from the harassment and was hospitalised in the psych ward after a suicide attempt.
It led some to wonder if things were taken too far, with a number saying that she should be allowed to freely display her interest in things she likes.