Why Is YouTube Beauty Influencer Tati Westbrook Getting So Much Hate?

Her best of/worst of series, as well as her PR unboxing videos and luxury vs. drugstore makeup critiques, often featuring her husband James or her dog Puka, have won her millions of fans and loyal viewers around the world.

She was also at the forefront of beauty YouTube’s biggest scandal of the last few years, which resulted in the dissolution of her friendship with other controversial beauty influencers James Charles and Jeffree Star. In the wake of the drama, as well as a contentious ongoing legal battle within her own brand which eventually shut down, Tati and her husband, who were nearing divorce, left their lavish LA lifestyle behind and moved to Fort Worth, Texas. 

Tati’s been upfront with her viewers about her marital problems, her business dealings, and the new era she’s undergoing with major changes to her health and wellness. She’s admitted publicly to fertility struggles and other health issues, like an eating disorder with residual effects, and her recent videos address how she’s been changing her diet, exercise, and even skincare routine to live cleanly and without hormonal or endocrine disruptors and other harsh chemicals with potentially harmful side effects.

It’s easy to see that Tati is living her best life since she moved east, but her lifestyle changes and her public recommendation of clean living haven’t been well-received. She’s been accused of alienating her audience, being privileged and out-of-touch, and even being an anti-Semite. So why is Tati Westbrook getting so much hate?

Tati’s Clean Living Claims

In a video posted August 29, Tati hosted a “get ready with me Q&A” where she covered all things fertility, health and wellness, and spirituality. The video has over 480,000 views, and though her video was well-received by her followers, other content creators and so-called “commentary channels” tore it apart.

Before we dive into Tati’s specific claims, let’s first acknowledge that not everyone has the capability to live a “clean” and toxin-free lifestyle. While environmentally friendly cleaning products and organic foods are slowly becoming more accessible and more mainstream, there’s often a huge markup attached to the “clean” label that we can’t ignore. Tati is an influencer and a multimillionaire, but many of the changes she’s made to her diet really aren’t all that wild or unconventional. 

One of the main concerns was Tati’s admission of her reliance on animal fats after heavily avoiding them for so long. We know by now that there’s a huge stigma around saturated fats, like eggs, which apparently clog our arteries and are so harmful we should completely excommunicate them from our diet. We know that cholesterol plays a role in heart disease, the number one killer of Americans today, but there’s no authoritative evidence to suggest that heart disease is solely caused by saturated fats. In fact, eggs are absolutely essential to our nutrition and contain helpful nutrients our diet and our hormones desperately need. But established institutions that govern the health rhetoric in this country, like the American Heart Association and the World Health Organization, would have you believe otherwise. 

Tati admitted that she is proudly medication-free when she was once on anti-depressants.

Some saturated fats are better than others. It’s not rocket science – you’re better off eating grass-fed meat, butter, and eggs than you are a large order of french fries from McDonald’s cooked in vegetable oil. Which brings us to our next point: Many critics have rightfully pointed out that Tati’s rejection of seed oils is a trendy dietary choice. But again, after relying so long on the word of the AHA and other governing bodies who are only too eager to promote the use of seed oils as basically harmless, the new emergence of seed oil-free diets has woken many up to its dangers.

Canola and vegetable oil are labeled as “heart-healthy” and a preventative measure against heart disease, but that label really holds no water. Seed oils are extremely detrimental to our diet because their refining process creates oxidation which results in aldehydes, a chemical component that is connected to obesity and mental decline. With so much of our American diet heavily dependent on processed foods cooked in these oils, it’s no wonder we lead the world in obesity and heart disease.

Tati also mentions in her video that she’s changed her diet according to her hormones. She gives the example that while intermittent fasting may work for men, it might not for women because of the demands of our biology and our fluctuating hormones, which one commentator described as “sexist.” She’s also admitted that she is proudly medication-free when she was once on anti-depressants, and as you can guess, with 1 in 5 women between 40 to 59 and 18% of all women currently on SSRIs – a number that only keeps climbing – this didn’t go over well.

The “Political” Connotations of Tati’s Lifestyle Changes

Tati proudly asserts that she is “healing her body” through her diet, and since our culture is dominated by the messaging of third-wave feminism or “women supporting women,” these changes should be well-received, right? 

In many of the response videos, there’s a certain undertone to all the criticism. On the surface level, many critics are rightfully pointing out how parasocial relationships function with impressionable young audiences. Because of Tati’s following, it’s not out of the realm of possibility that her influence would lead some of her followers to make these same changes solely based on her recommendation. And what works for her may not work for them.

But these commentators also have extremely large followings and have no qualms about promoting their own lifestyle to their followers, be it vegan or progressively left-leaning or otherwise. One critic makes the insane jump that Tati’s current diet choices are a hallmark of QAnonism. That same critic also proposes a supposed link between anti-Semitism and not drinking fluoridated water, which Tati has given up. Of course, there’s no explanation for how these two are somehow related, and we, the viewers, are left confused more than anything else.

Tati made changes she believes will benefit her, but the most tolerant, supportive crowd has only intolerance.

There’s also Tati’s spiritual journey. She’s been forthcoming about conflicts within her marriage, which almost led to divorce, and her fertility struggles. Like many other Californians, Tati and her husband, James Westbrook, left LA (in plain terms, a failure of Democratic leadership and management) for one of the reddest states in the nation. The sad truth of it is, media consumers – especially when that media features the icons of popular culture – rarely love a marriage that stays together rather than the drama of one that falls apart. They dislike this almost as much as Christianity, which Tati is refreshingly uninhibited about as well. She’s discussed her dislike of New Age spiritual practices, like tarot cards, psychics, and mediums, and all of this combined has shut her out of the LA crowd she was once a fixture in.

The Best Revenge Is Living Well

Tati has lived a rough few years, and all of her drama has been aired to the world. Though things are looking up for her, she’s still in litigation with one of her companies and still remembered first and foremost for her part in 2020’s beauty “dramageddon,” and not any contributions she’s made since.

They say the best revenge is living well, and Tati is certainly doing that. She’s still married to her lovely husband and still doing what she loves, and by her own admission, she feels physically, mentally, and spiritually better.

If her critics’ main concern is that she’s promoting a certain lifestyle to her followers, their concern is as inequitable as it is insincere. This isn’t about Tati being an influencer or her privilege or the business she’s built for herself and her family. It’s about the larger choices she’s made for her own life and the fact that they go against the grain. It’s also about hypocrisy. Tati has made changes she believes will better benefit her own life, but the most tolerant, supportive crowd has only intolerance and disparagement to offer.

Closing Thoughts

When YouTube was in its infancy and influencers as we know them today weren’t even a blip on the radar, Tati was already building a business and gaining momentum as one of the first. Many content creators, including her critics, are able to do what they do because she did it first. 

While I’m sure I’m not the only one who doesn’t 100% agree with every one of her hot takes, it’s refreshing to see a public figure be excruciatingly open and honest, especially when others don’t like what she has to say.

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