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Vine Star Matthew Espinosa Uses The N-Word, Social Media Erupts In A Hashtag Protest

By Soumashree Sarkar
Published on: 18:22 PST, Aug 4, 2016

Vine star Matthew Espinosa courted controversy by using the N-word in a Snapchat video.

The 18-year-old actor, who became famous for his uploads on the six-second video sharing website Vine, has an immense social media following, most of whom turned against him when he casually captioned a Snapchat upload with the words, “N**** yo song sucks.”

Twitter fans of Vine star Espinosa reacted almost immediately under the umbrella of the now trending hashtag #MatthewExposedparty.

With 5.1 million followers on Instagram and 3.8 million followers on Twitter, Matthew Espinosa is one of the most popular young social media stars of the day.

His updates have usually hovered around the inspirational, and amid his calls for people to put down their phones and connect more in real life, he has garnered a loyal following that appreciated his simple outlook.

Matthew Espinosa poses with adoptable puppies from The Shelter Pet Project during the 2015 MTV Video Music Awards. [Photo by Mike Windle/Getty Images]

The Vine star reacted on the face of the hashtag onslaught with a tweet that seemed to allege that he was not responsible for the Snap. Matthew wrote that he was also discomfited by the upload, which his friends seemed to have made without his permission.

While some fans had already speculated that Espinosa will be accusing his friends without taking the blame on himself, some others have been pointing out to him why his use of the word is offensive and can be taken as an instance of unintentional racism.

Matthew himself has said that he loves everyone and has since been retweeting messages of support that his fans have been sending him. The Vine star has also followed many of his fans who are writing in support of him.

Espinosa’s fans have started the hashtag #EspinosasForLife in a show of love and support for their icon at a time when most of his fan base have turned on him for his insensitivity.

With 6.3 million followers on Vine, Espinosa was recently in the news for another Snapchat update. This one, though, was far less controversial. It announced the fact that the Vine star had begun dating 24-year-old model Jessica Serfaty.

The new couple cuddled in a cute video that made headlines and earned them congratulations from the world over.

Serfaty, who found fame through America’s Next Top Model, herself tweeted in support of Matthew and called the fans who were blocking and berating him “fake.”

As Vine star Matthew Espinosa also took to blocking fans on Snapchat, many took the chance to remind others of the time when he came under the spotlight for sporting blackface to represent a fictional character at the VidCon last year.

Espinosa had debuted his alter ego named “Papa Squat, O.G.” at the VidCon. As reported by Superfame, he meant to masquerade as an older black man with a graying afro, by applying brown makeup, in what was an insensitive perpetuation of blackface.

He even set up Instagram and Twitter profiles of this “Original Gangster” and came to the event sporting a new accent. Compared to now, the backlash was lower in intensity then and did not involve too many fans of Espinosa himself.

Matthew had insisted that his actions were well-intentioned at the time and even mentioned how his photographs in the costume made him “laugh.”

Matthew Espinosa is not the only Vine star to have come under the “over party” fire in recent times. Viner Cameron Dallas has also had to apologize for a comment on Jessica Alba.

After he said that he would rather use Justin Timberlake’s toothbrush than Alba’s because he did not know where Alba had been, Twitter erupted under #CameronDallasIsOverParty.

Fans were naturally shocked at the 21-year-old slut-shaming Alba, but while Vine Star Matthew Espinosa has a comparatively cleaner image, Dallas has routinely posted questionable words that have angered fans.

[Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP Images]

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