RiceGum: Why He Handled The Gabbie Show Situation Wrong Even If He Didn’t Hit Her

On March 28, YouTuber The Gabbie Show accused RiceGum of assaulting her during a confrontation at a party. The next day, he responded with insults, mockery, and threats. Whether or not he actually harmed her, this was 100% the wrong way to handle it.

I’m sure we can all agree that violence of any kind is wrong. Destroying someone’s property is wrong. Hitting a woman is wrong. However, even if RiceGum, 20, didn’t do any of these things (though he did admit to breaking The Gabbie Show’s phone), the way he handled her assault claims was still dead wrong.

Gabbie Hanna, 26, took to Snapchat and then Twitter on March 28 and 29 to claim that she saw RiceGum at a party, and went over to him to try to spark up a “rap battle” and break the ice since they’ve had YouTube beef in the past. He allegedly responded by twisting her arm, pinning her to the ground, and smashing her cell phone. These allegations are sobering, and unfortunately there’s no evidence so it’s his word against hers. We may never know what actually happened, but we know how RiceGum responded, and it was straight-up bad.

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since he deleted himself mocking abuse, i figured id leave it here. nice back peddle. pic.twitter.com/GP9cvYD4Gb

— SHUT ME UP👊🏼💋out now! (@GabbieHanna) March 30, 2017

“I did not hit a girl lmao this b*tch is tripping,” he wrote on Twitter. “We’re talking about a person who has built a career off over exaggerating & lying about stories for $. This is exactly what she wants. F*ck this girl and all this fake sh*t. Ask anyone at that party.” Look, I get that it would be frustrating to have someone make accusations against you that are super serious and possibly untrue. However, his reaction is unfortunately what way too many victims of abuse get: he painted her as a liar, swore at her, tried to undermine her credibility and turn people against her.

When she tried to offer some kind of proof to her followers by sharing a tearful video with an in-depth explanation and photographs of scratches on her neck, shoulder, wrist, and leg that she insists he caused, he mocked her. RiceGum quickly posted (and deleted) a video where he scratched his own shoulder and whined in a high-pitched voice “ow he hit me!” Again, he made light of her claims and tried to paint her as a liar.

“That’s right. Teach everyone that if you try to speak out, you’all be called a liar. Role model of the year,” Gabbie clapped back. When fans confronted him about his response and victim-shaming, he tweeted “I’m not mocking abuse I’m mocking people who lie about being abused.”

RiceGum: See Pics Of The Controversial YouTuber

RiceGum has 1.32 million followers on Twitter, and 5.3 million subscribers on YouTube (not to mention Gabbie’s 4 million). Many of these supporters are young people, and he needs to consider the impact his words have. From his reaction, teen girls have learned that if they speak up about abuse, they will be shut down, and young boys have learned that in order to avoid blame, all they have to do is call their victim a liar.

Again, RiceGum may not have hurt Gabbie in any way, there’s no way for us to know. But his flippant, angry response was not the correct way to handle it. A more solemn, genuine approach to telling his side of the story (not to mention a sincere public apology for destroying Gabbie’s phone and maybe being rougher with her than he meant to be) would not only be more effective, but a better example for his young followers.

HollywoodLifers, what do you think about how RiceGum handled Gabbie’s claims? Let us know!