Based on the comments we’ve received on fellow VTP writer Sarah Bui’s last Michelle Phan post, it seems like the YouTube make-up guru is a pretty polarizing figure within the community. Some love her, some hate her, some admire her for her talent but question her taste. Whether or not you call yourself a Phan fan though, it’s hard to deny her incredible media presence. With over a million subscribers, Phan recently edged out parody producer VenetianPrincess as the top subscribed female YouTuber.
Following her newfound no.1 status, Phan’s taken the opportunity to work in a philanthropic message in her latest video, wherein she discusses her Vietnamese origins, the values her mother instilled in her as a child, and her current efforts to help end malaria.
She also recently tweeted, “Going to Vietnam for the first time The motherland for me! I’m going to be doing some charity work. http://huff.to/9xKYbd.”
The link in her tweet forwards you to Phan’s recent blog on the Huffington Post, where she wrote:
Growing up as the daughter of Vietnamese immigrants, I am well aware of the adverse effects malaria can have on a nation. I will be visiting Vietnam for the first time this month, and while I do not know what to expect on my trip, I know that Vietnam is an under-developed country home to millions of beautiful people that do not enjoy the same medical care that we do here in the United States. While I am honored to be a Vietnamese-American, I still feel a very strong connection to my roots and to my family that I have never met. As my audience on Youtube has grown, so has the responsibility to use my network to create positive messages of self-beauty, and to raise awareness for causes such as the fight to #endmalaria.
I suspect some anti-Phan extremists will find a way to warp this into another Michelle Phan antic, while fans will continue subscribing to her in spite of it all, but I think, as long as she’s not marring the cause against Malaria, at least she can use her celebrity status to raise awareness for a cause that desperately needs international attention. Many of us in the Western world probably take it for granted that we can go to bed at night without fear of waking up infected the next morning.
As the World Health Organization points out, 243 million people were afflicted with malaria in 2008, and 10% of those afflictions were concentrated in Southeast Asia. Vietnam in particular has done well to reduce malaria affliction by 85% in the last ten years–from 383,000 in 1998 to 60,400 in 2008–but outbreaks still threaten the country. Just last April, Vietnamese News Agency reported a malaria epidemic that swept through 15 provinces in Vietnam’s Central Highlands.
So while many netizens will continue to disagree on Michelle Phan’s character, let’s not let that dissension overshadow the real point Phan’s trying to drive at–that Malaria is still a crippling force in the 21st century, but that something as simple as a treated mosquito net can help ameliorate the situation.
There’s a lot you can do to help end malaria. Check out Malaria No More or WorldVision’s End Malaria Campaign if you’d like to help out. And if there’s more information that you think VTP should know, please do contact us.
Revision: It looks like Michelle Phan did not end up going to Vietnam this year as she stated. When Twitter user TiffanysBlueBox tweeted, “@RiceBunny what happened to going to vietnam?” on November 22, Phan responded, ” Couldn’t make it on this trip because of Thanksgiving. I’ll be going next year =)”
Sources:
Michelle Phan said she was going to visit her motherland,but did she do that?No,she only bragged about that just like many other things.Liars will be liars.
You wrote in your article about “anti-phans”,you should know the reasons why her fans are starting to get so tired of seeing her face all over Youtube to shove that toxic products IQQU to her young fans.I can’t be proud of her because she belongs to Japan and Thailand
.I bought her acne syrum and my face still have very bad scars from how it broke my skin out.I contacted her to ask questions but she blocked me to hide the true about how bad her products are.I’m a 16 years old Vietnamese girl,my mom told me to stop watching her because she does all wrong in makeup and misleads young girl to do many wrong things,my mom also says she looks and communicates online like a non home training girl,I don’t like her anymore because everytime I see the scars on my face that still not go away from her expensive IQQU,I want to cry for how silly I am to ignored my mom’s warning and trusted Michelle Phan to buy it.
You might call me an anti-phan,because she is a liar and she does keep any promise.Please do your research before posting articles like this,what you wrote is too far wrong from the facts.SHE DID NOT GO TO VIETNAM AS SHE LIED ABOUT!She went to Thailand to promote the sale for those horrible IQQU products that are made so cheap in Thailand but sell so expensive to the young girls and most of us got our skin all ruined.My mom said she is a scam.Please becareful with what you post on internet,I write this comment to ask you not to mislead the young girls in our country to follow Michelle Phan,she is a bad role model for Vietnamese young girls.
Maybe your skin is just allergic to it. Just because YOU got scars doesn’t mean that anybody else did.
How can you not seeing that this makeup guru is all into herself?She gave $30 dollar to malaria but creamed for the whole world to know while she collected so much money on her charity channel and never publish where she donated that money to,and ignored when ppl asked her about it.
I read your article and think you know nothing about Michelle Phan.I’m so tired of her lies and how she’s so full of herself,especially when I read what you called ppl “anti-Phan”,don’t you try to think why so many ppl dislike her now?
I’m a Vietnamese too and was so proud of her and watch her vids since I was 15, I was too young,I grew older and wouldn’t be fooled by her now.I wish she learns from Natalie Tran,she’s so humble.friendly,natural and honest!Do you know Natalie Tran?
Michelle Phan needs to disappear on Youtube.She is going down now,she should quit before she become another Tila Tequila Nguyen,do you know who Tila is?
When will we get a story exposing her? So sick of her facade. She needs to eat some humble pie.
@M
Can someone help many young Vietnamese girls by exposing the truths about Michelle Phan,please?
The author of this article should know that she is not as charitable as said,please read the other Vietnam Talking Point Michelle Phan article and go through the comment section to learn the truth about her.I have no reason to dislike Michelle if she has real talents, being an honest and humble Vietnamese girl…but all I see from her is a fake and cheating person.Vietnam Talking Point should be a website that post all the truths,not to post untrue articles to rave a greedy and fake person like Michelle Phan.
I don’t know why Vietnam Talking Point website hides the truths about her,JUST BECAUSE SHE IS VIETNAMESE?Do they care that Michelle is fooling and cheating alot of very youngVietnamese teenagers to buy her bad IQQU products then doesn’t take any respoinsibility after they paid her online through PayPal?
It sickens me to think what was going through her head as she made this video. She probably wakes up thinking “Oh! I think I’m going to pretend I’m going to Vietnam today! To top it all off, I’m going to pretend I’ll be doing charity work. Maybe even include a segment about malaria in my video, to ‘raise awareness'”. The day she starts accepting her mixed feedback on her videos, AND product line, is the day I will subscribe to her again.
@ 19 year old Vietgirl : thought you were ..you know..19?! so…how come you’ve been watching her vids ever since she was 15 ? thought she began posting videos on YT in 2007?
you know, it’s quite peculiar how every time there’s a new article about phan on this website (paired with some negative comments from supposedly vietnamese people ) one can find about it from this one source i won’t bother to cite. XD” makes you think about checking the IPs of the commenters, eh?
on topic: i think it’s great how she supports a cause which implies the prevention of malaria. also, it’s admirable how instead of having a “huge giveaway” like some other MU gurus (with stuff they anyway get for free) she thinks about the less fortunate ones!
I knew Michelle a 5 weeks before my 16 bday,I just turn 19 three days ago.Do you want me to tell you what she wrote in her Xanga?I think if you read how she put down extravagant ppl who buy think they don’t need just to impress ppl they don’t like,you would never believe you know the same Michelle Phan nowadays.
No one expect her to go to Vietnam to donate,poor ppl there didn’t ask her for anything but if she announce that she is a charitable person and will go to Vietnam to donate,she better do as she promise or she can’t blame how ppl call her a liar and a bragger,right?
*typo:I meant about 5 wks before my 16 bday.
I’m pretty sure she is almost hitting a breaking point. The way she responds (or defends herself) to the comments on her videos, is completely unnecessary and sometimes rude. When you’re exposed to the media and you put your face out there, you are bound to get fans and haters. There is no way around it. And if she can’t handle it, she should take herself out of the spotlight. If she “loves what she does,” then she should do it anyways and IGNORE the bad comments.
As for “I’m a Vietnamese-American claim…” Well the only thing Vietnamese related things she seems to be associating herself with is the food. Granted, Viet food is yummy and it’s part of culture too, But I’m sure there are OTHER Viet things she could associate herself with.
So far I’ve seen her play with katanas (or whatever those swords are called), do anime videos (which are both Japanese related) and oh that Thailand video.
Not hating, I used to be a fan/phan. But now she’s more focused on photoshopping, posing in her videos (which takes up half the video btw), and lying to her fans.
That is not the Michelle I once saw on YouTube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M6NX_roKlL4
LOL. Really painful to watch her lie and try to avoid the question of whether or not she donates to charity.
I don’t know why she have to lie so much about everything now a days. She never went to Vietnam or actually did any charity work. She did post a lot of photos of herself and photoshop it while she was away. She was also wearing thai clothing and showing off. She did posted pictures of school childern in thailand and said she went there to help the poor kids but I find it to be fake because she wasn’t even in those pictures because knowing her she love to take pictures of herself since she does update facebook with a new picture of herself everyday. I really wish she would just be honest. No one care if she isn’t that charitable but since she kept saying she is and don’t back up her own words it’s just sad and pathetic. Only the worst kind of people would lie about charity. Also about the Malaria video, it wasn’t even about Malaria but about herself saying what a wonderful and beautiful person she is. She also lie in that video saying only $1 can make a difference but she won’t accept anything less than $5. Also she didn’t even know what she was doing in that video. Someone told her that buying mosquito nets isn’t going stop malaria and the money should go to cures. Michelle told that person that there is no cure for malaria and prevention is important. The guy replied back saying he suffered from malaria and how could she say that. She told him to read the info from the website and that there is no cure. She is just ignorant and arrogant.
How could you say that? You don’t even know her well. She probably couldn’t go because of some issues. For all you know she could have gotten sick. And why would she post pictures of her in it with the kids fron Vietnam? Thats kinda dumb. Its like heyy its pictures of the kids.. and heyy its me standing here when this picture is supposed to have the kids in it.
BTW maybe she wont accept unde 5 because she was going to ship the money to some place and they
only accept 5 or more. Maybe if YOU only have one fudging buck she meant to ask your family for a few bucks. And who cares? Whether she asked for 1 buck or 5 she still wanted to help.
She needs to be put under lie detector to treat her problems with lying.Does she think her fans are so dumb?She should quit showing up on Youtube and go to the psy dr to get treatments.
She runs her smart mouth lying about everything.How should young Vietnameses be proud of someone like her?
We are known for working hard to earn living,she shouldnot cheat ppl to get all kind of free money and fame like that.I got so fed up with the story of Michelle and charity,the moment your money get in her bank,you lost it.How can someone lie about giving to the poor?She made a charity channel and didn’t give the money out to anywhere,when ppl asked her on blogTV,she said she LOST THE RECEIPTS!
What did she do that need to have a receipt to proveGiving her junks to Salvation Army to deduct tax?Because any other charity organization wouldn’t have any problem to issue a duplicated certification to her.
If she chose to be a nonstop liar like that,at least do the research to back it up.No one beg her to go to Vietnam to give anything.I wish that Thai school will find out her lies and call her out on it,many Thai ppl want to know what’s the name of that school and where it’s located at,I hope she can answer them.
Lying about charity to get credit is the biggest sin.
i used to like her too until i found out how much of a fake she was and i just stopped. expose her like michellephail.tumblr.com did (they have hard evidence) and please spread the word before she ruins other faces and confidence!
Hope all you gals/guys at least feel better about yourself after all these bashing of MP, after whatever damages she had caused you! Otherwise, it is rather a waste of the obvious self exposing of insecurity, jealousy and selfishness of yourselves. Nobody is forcing any body to watch and try what MP is doing on HER page! I am sure you all are big donors and philanthrophists to the needy ones in VN, right? You love and support the development & success of Vnmese youth, right?