YouTube and Instagram influencer James Charles caused outrage among his fans with a “pregnancy” photoshoot inspired by pop star Halsey‘s own pregnancy reveal last month. Charles, 21, took fellow influencer Laura Mellado up on a dare to see what it was like to be pregnant for 24 hours, even wearing two silicone baby bumps to see what pregnancy was like for a woman at least 40 weeks along. During that day, Charles did a photoshoot, where he posed like Halsey in front of a flower arrangement inspired by Beyonce’s famous 2017 pregnancy reveal.
Charles shared the photo on his Instagram page, adding just “Surprise” in the caption. This was very similar to Halsey’s own caption. Charles was also photoshopped to appear nude in the picture. In the video about Charles’ experience as “pregnant,” a woman can be heard calling his pose “very Halsey.”Over 3.6 million Instagram users liked his post in just one day. The YouTube video has over 4.3 million views. In the clip, Charles said he did not want to have children himself. “I can’t. It’s not for me,” he said, notes E! News.
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Considering Halsey’s struggles to get pregnant, her fans were not happy to see her pregnancy reveal mocked. In 2016, Halsey revealed she suffered a miscarriage the year before. In 2018, she opened up about her battle with endometriosis, a disorder in which tissue that usually grows inside the uterus grows outside the organ. She revealed on The Doctors that she planned to freeze her eggs. After announcing she and Alev Aydin are expecting a baby together, Halsey posted photos of the scars from her surgery.
After Charles posted his photo, Halsey’s fans thought he was making light of her struggles. “I’m sorry but James Charles and his team really filmed that shit, made those comments, and didn’t see anything wrong with it?” one person wrote on Twitter. “How thirsty for clout can you be?! So gross, disrespectful, and insensitive. Also, I’m sure he’s at an age where he knows that pregnancy jokes aren’t ok.”
“I totally agree with you, it is so disrespectful regarding what Halsey went through and he’s clearly not giving a s— about it,” another fan wrote. “It makes me so angry because he’s mocking her and her history and I can’t imagine how sad and angry she might have been when she saw the picture.” Another chimed in, “Halsey had endometriosis and James Charles team said ‘very Halsey’ while he was taking F— FAKE pregnancy photos??????”
