MrBeast/YouTube
MrBeast has amassed a massive following with the YouTube empire that recently allowed him to get up close and personal with some remnants of the Mayan empire with some help from Mexico’s government. However, the country is trying to get him to pay for using the tour to promote his line of candy.
Most people who spend a fair amount of time on the internet are probably at least aware of MrBeast (real name Jimmy Donaldson), the YouTube sensation who has racked up close to 400 million subscribers on the platform while routinely racking up hundreds of millions of views on the videos he’s spent years engineering to go viral.
MrBeast is best known for organizing contests and challenges where he puts life-changing amounts of money on the line with the help of the revenue that’s also allowed him to produce content that revolves around him flexing his wealth by doing things like crushing a Lamborghini with the “world’s largest shredder.”
He’s also been no stranger to controversy; a number of contestants who competed on the Squid Games-inspired reality competition he made for Amazon sued him last year while alleging they were subjected to dangerous conditions, and some of his former employees have accused him of fostering a toxic work environment.
However, there’s no shortage of people who are more than happy to work with a man with one of the biggest platforms the internet has to offer, and the Mexican government decided to give him and some members of his crew a permit to film while touring various sites that were constructed when the Mayans reigned supreme.
That included access to some temples and pyramids that most tourists aren’t given, including one that was built thousands of years ago and another, El Castillo (a.k.a the Pyramid of Kukulcan), that boasts a sacred room at the top that MrBeast was allowed to infiltrate with a drone.
Of course, it wouldn’t truly be a MrBeast video without some shameless self-promotion, and he firmly checked that box around the 13:20 mark when he and his buddies capped off a meal at base camp with some peanut butter cups that recently joined the lineup of his Feastables brand—a product he described as “the only Mayan-approved snack on the planet.”
According to The Guardian, that did not sit well with Mexico’s National Institute of Archaeology and History, which filed a formal complaint before Mexican president Claudia Sheinbaum hinted the video violated the terms of the permit MrBeast’s production company received, and officials issued a statement saying they are “demanding compensation for damages and a public retraction due to noncompliance with the terms.”
He probably won’t have much trouble covering the bill based on how much money he has at his disposal, but it’s still not the best look.
Content shared from brobible.com.