YouTube Star Nicole Arbour Fired From Film After 'Dear Fat People' Backlash

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Nicole Arbour has fired up quite a bit of controversy since the release of a video, which many have dubbed as "fat shaming." Now it appears the backlash has cost her a job.

In the six-minute diatribe, “Dear Fat People,” Arbour claims that fat-shaming is “not a thing,” suggesting people made it up. She even tries to humorously encourage obese people to lose weight, but not everyone saw her jokes as funny.

Director Pat Mills certainly didn't, and told Zap2it that he fired Arbour, who was hired to help with choreography for his anti-bullying dance film, Don't Talk to Irene.


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"[I'm making] a dance movie, so obviously we needed a choreographer. We met with a woman who not only did traditional dance choreography, but was a cheerleader as well. She was fun and nice and had a lot of energy," Mills told the website in a statement. "[Arbour told me she] had a YouTube channel and identified as a 'YouTuber.' She seemed like a perfect fit for the project. I shared the script with her. She said she dug it and was excited to come on board."

The director said after viewing "Dear Fat People," which has garnered over three million views, it "made me never want to see her again."


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"'Dear Fat People' is an unfunny and cruel fat-shaming video that guises itself about being about 'health,'" Mills said. "It's fat-phobic and awful. It went on for over six minutes. I felt like I had been punched in the gut."

He added, "I'm gay. I was bullied a lot as a kid. I am no stranger to ridicule and loneliness."


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While Mills claims it was his decision to fire Arbour from Don't Talk to Irene, the comedian insists she never had anything to do with the project.

"I'm not currently, nor have I been attached to any feature films as of late," Arbour tweeted with the hashtag "#gossip."

Meanwhile, the comedian's response to controversy surrounding her video seems to be "sorry not sorry."

"I feel it's really important that we make fun of everybody," she told Time. "I think [what] brings us together and unites us as people is that we can poke fun at all of us."


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Arbour also implied that she's being criticized over the video because she is a woman. "The reason there's an issue is because I don't 'look' like a traditional comedian," she tweeted. "If I were a guy, people would have lol'd n moved on."


Whose side are you on?

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