‘I was young and living in my own little bubble’: Britain’s Got Talent judge KSI dismisses his misogynistic videos as teenage ‘mistakes’ as he slams the manosphere for being ‘all about money’
KSI has described potentially damaging social media posts in which he was seen joking about rape and violent attacks on women as teenage ‘mistakes’.
London-based influencer, boxer and TV star, real name Olajide Olayinka Williams Olatunji, has achieved massive mainstream success since launching his YouTube career in 2008 under his former username JideJunior.
Such is her popularity that Simon Cowell was encouraged to sign her as the latest addition to the judging panel for Britain’s Got Talent in 2025, giving her a primetime platform and a new fan base.
But unsavory clips of the 32-year-old’s misogynistic jokes about rape and claims she would rather ‘punch a baby’ than practice safe sex have damaged her reputation and threatened her current role on Saturday night TV.
Minimizing anger during an interview TimesKSI claimed that the offensive posts, recorded between 2012 and 2017, were the result of naivety.
‘A lot of my old, old content was very, very embarrassing,’ he said. ‘I didn’t know what the internet would be, I was young and living in my own little bubble.
KSI has dismissed potentially damaging social media posts in which he appeared to joke about rape and violent attacks on women as teenage ‘mistakes’
‘I’ve made mistakes throughout my life, but as long as you learn from them, you can get better.’
Away from the glare of reality TV and social media, KSI, an acronym that stands for Knowledge, Power, Integrity, has proven himself as an astute businessman by launching the Prime energy drink brand with Logan Paul in 2022.
Sports promotion company Misfits Boxing, his long-term manager Mams Taylor and promoters Kalle and Nisse Sauerland has also raised its profile in boxing and mixed martial arts.
In March, KSI bought a minority stake in struggling football club Dagenham & Redbridge, which currently plies its trade in the semi-professional National League South, with the aim of replicating the success of Welsh team Wrexham by cashing in on its takeover in a documentary series.
And KSI thinks it’s his willingness to learn from his early notoriety that he believes sets him apart from other young male influencers, particularly Harrison Sullivan, aka HSTikkyTokky, the subject of Louis Theroux’s latest Netflix documentary about the manosphere.
‘Someone like HS doesn’t care. “For him, it’s all about the money,” he said of the influencer he’s known for years.
‘I know what I can do to get loads of views but I don’t need to do that. There’s low hanging fruit, but I don’t agree with that because I’ve realized that if you just be yourself, that’s enough.
‘If you bring positivity you may not get the first opinion, but you are building a foundation that can grow and I think my route is much more productive rather than doing short-term things.’
She added: ‘I can’t look in the mirror and do the crazy things you see HS doing and not feel good about myself. I have a backbone, I have boundaries.
‘Because the older I got, the more I realized how effective I was. ‘My audience sees me as a role model, so I need to set a good example.’
Distasteful clips of the 32-year-old woman making misogynistic jokes about rape and claiming she would rather ‘punch a baby’ than practice safe sex have damaged her reputation
KSI believes his willingness to learn from his mistakes sets him apart from other young male influencers, especially Harrison Sullivan, aka HSTikkyTokky (pictured)
KSI, whose real name is Olajide Olayinka Williams Olatunji, was criticized for the statements he made during the memorial ceremony of his mother Yinka Olatunji’s 60th birthday in 2012.
In the video, which has since been deleted, he tells his followers that he wanted to ‘slap a female character very hard in the face’ and then refer to her as a ‘stupid bitch’, adding: ‘I won’t even feel sorry for her if she gets raped.’
Lucy Duckworth, of rape support organization The Survivors Trust, said: ‘Minimising rape creates violence and leads to loss of life. We cannot justify this. You can’t joke about someone else’s victimization experience.
‘You shouldn’t comment on this unless you’ve experienced it yourself.’
KSI made a joke about ‘punching a woman’ in another deleted YouTube video in 2017.
KSI, who has 17 million YouTube subscribers, said: ‘I’ll punch the baby if she gets pregnant’ after her mother reminded her to always use a condom.
A spokesperson for Women’s Aid said: ‘It is completely unacceptable for comments like this to be made, even if they are meant as a joke. It is a sad fact that pregnant women are exposed to domestic violence more than other women.
‘Such ‘jokes’ make such criminal behavior experienced by women seem less serious and actually life-threatening than it is.’
Meanwhile, a source close to KSI told the publication: ‘The video dates back almost a decade and, like many people as they get older, KSI looks back on that time with deep regret and admits that the language he used was both stupid and wrong.’
