Jirard Khalil threatens to sue the Internet

by ersatz_cats

Last month, I published a brief overview of the charity fraud situation involving gaming YouTuber Jirard Khalil, a.k.a. “The Completionist”. Obviously, this followed up on the bold investigative work by Karl Jobst and Mutahar Anas of channel “SomeOrdinaryGamers”. While I had nothing significant to add in the way of evidence, I found the situation shocking and alarming, and certainly worth not being brushed aside as mere “YouTube drama”. Also, my perusal of social media reactions showed that many people were misunderstanding both the existing evidence against Jirard and the exact allegations being levied against him and his family’s charity, the Open Hand Foundation. I don’t know if there’s literally any audience that reads this blog who doesn’t also watch Karl’s videos, but if there was, I wanted to do what I could to add clarity to that situation.

While I didn’t intend to follow up on this fiasco any further – for the time being, I’ve hoped to keep my serious investigative work focused on the Billy Mitchell lolsuit, for as long as that drags on – an update to that story was necessitated by two new revelations. First, OHF did finally follow through on a donation of $600,000 to the Association for Frontotemporal Degeneration. This at least resolved the question of where the missing money went. However, concurrent to this donation, it was discovered that OHF had supposedly been receiving significant additional revenue from the Khalil family’s golf tournament, and that this money was not reflected in their tax filings.

But once again, I felt I had said my piece. I didn’t expect to need to come back to this story yet again. After all, what else could possibly happen that would require me, little old ersatz, to speak up about this situation being heavily reported on by so many others with such larger platforms?

And then we got Jirard’s “apology” video. I put “apology” in quotes because, while Jirard does say multiple times he’s sorry for things he said which were “potentially” misleading, his own actions are heavily downplayed relative to the focus he puts on the unidentified individuals he lumps together as his “accusers”. In fact, at no point does Jirard himself refer to this video as an “apology”. Both the title and thumbnail identify it simply as “My response”:

And on Twitter, while Jirard does offer an apology to “anyone affected by this situation”, the video itself is framed as “my only video response on the topic”, adding that he hopes it brings “some clarity and transparency to the recent allegations”:

As I’ll detail below, I found this “apology” to be highly manipulative, and disturbingly abusive of the community’s trust. While the video did briefly enjoy a wave of positive response from Jirard’s loyal subscribers, who eagerly awaited his assurances of innocence and who responded as soon as they heard the notification bell, it does seem the public at large has since caught on to the toxic implications bubbling just beneath the surface. The like-to-dislike ratio for Jirard’s video on YouTube plummeted in the days after publication, and the vast majority of social media reactions since have been negative. However, it’s still worth discussing the broader implications and ramifications this vindictive “apology” could have on Internet journalism, charity accountability in general, and community trust. Jirard used this one-time opportunity to deflect responsibility, to tell more lies, and to go on the offensive against the very people who correctly brought this story to light. Behavior like Jirard’s simply cannot be ignored. Despite what a few rubes rushed to declare, Jirard’s “response” could actually be the worst Internet apology of all time.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

Let’s start at the beginning, with the portions of the video which aren’t especially objectionable. At 0:50, Jirard references the recent donation, and apologizes for it taking too long:

I can confirm that, as of Wednesday, November 29, 2023, the Open Hand Foundation has donated $600,000 to the Association for Frontotemporal Degeneration. However, it did take too long to get to this moment, and for that, I am sorry.

To be clear, we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that the issue wasn’t exactly that the donation took a long time to happen. But whatever, he apologizes for that. At 2:00, Jirard completely handwaves away the issue of the golf tournament revenue by claiming he has never had anything to do with that event:

My father runs an annual golf tournament, and this golf event hasn’t always contained a charitable component, but has always been in dedication to my mother, to bring awareness to FTD. I would often be present at these events, but beyond giving an occasional speech, I was not and still am not involved in any of the event planning.

Great! So, while this may not be exactly what Jirard is saying, the message being conveyed is that he, personally, is off the hook for issues with the golf tournament revenue. That’s okay with me. It does seem a bit weird that the director of OHF would have nothing to say about those missing funds – and Jirard does circle back to the golf matter later in the video. This also doesn’t mean anything Karl or Muta said about the golf revenue is wrong. But upon first viewing, this feels like a satisfactory answer, at least as long as it’s true.

Jirard then briefly addresses the core issue, which was his misleading statements eliciting donations. First, as a refresher, let’s hear one example of these statements made during an IndieLand stream, as heard in Karl’s original video at 4:40:

We are raising money for dementia research in honor of my late mom, trying to help folks who’ve been impacted by dementia, working with organizations like USF… FTD Association of America, Alzheimer’s Association of America, and so many more.

Here’s how Jirard characterizes this, at 2:40 in his “response” video:

During several recent IndieLand events, press interviews, and podcasts, I went on record saying where the money was going to, and that the Open Hand Foundation had worked with various foundations. At different points, the foundation had been in communication with or considered several of them. But it was not appropriate for me to make such statements, when final actions had not yet been taken.

If you watch that segment, you can hear Jirard’s positive emphasis on how OHF “had been in communication with or considered several” of these charities, like it sorta maybe justifies him suggesting the charity was “working with” them. But obviously, any reasonable person who hears that a nonprofit “works with” other charities would come away thinking they actually collaborated on something, and not “We just chatted over email a bit”. This emphasis undercuts his eventual admission that the statements were “not appropriate”. In his heart of hearts, does he think the statements were justified or not?

At 3:00, Jirard tries to justify why the donation took so long:

The Open Hand Foundation’s goal was to make a large impact by donating the money to the right place. And a lot of the conversations that were had with various organizations involved the funds not being restricted, or came with extremely high administrative costs. Look, any way you say this, action needed to be taken. And to that point, I’m sorry.

The problem here is, this narrative seems to conflict with the story Jirard already gave to Karl and Muta in their private Discord call:

I was made aware in 2021 the money hadn’t moved yet. And that’s what made me go “That’s not fucking cool.” And that’s when I got personally involved to move it, and… not 2021, last year, 2022.

These statements could be reconciled, if others in OHF were amassing donation funds with the stated goal while Jirard himself was oblivious, if not again for Jirard’s position as director of OHF. So the “director” himself didn’t know what the organization was doing?

Jirard continues this apparent historical revisionism, at 3:20:

I’m disappointed that I was not more straight-forward regarding the foundation’s timeline for making donations, and that I made statements potentially implying donations were made when they had not yet been. It took too long for clear action to occur, and I apologize for all of this. But such action was not done for any selfish or malicious reasons.

For now, I’m going to set aside Jirard’s characterization that his statements were “potentially implying” that the money was being donated, when that was literally exactly what he was telling people. This whole video statement was obviously reviewed by an attorney, who either wrote or suggested edits to Jirard’s statements to avoid admissions of serious culpability. And so “I said” becomes “I made statements potentially implying”. In isolation, I actually have no problem with that. The lawyer is doing their job.

However, once again, this contradicts the story Jirard had previously spun. Was he failing to be “straight-forward” about OHF’s plans, or was he kept in the dark and simply saying what he believed to be true? Why can’t he just apologize for the thing he already said he did, rather than inventing some alternative version to apologize for? Or was the story he initially told Karl and Muta the fabrication? I get that this is an apology (no matter what Jirard calls it), and that apologies can be difficult, but it would really help to have some candor and transparency here.

At 3:40, Jirard offered an apology directly to donors and to everyone who has worked with him on the IndieLand charity streams:

I want to take this opportunity to apologize to any developers, publishers, content creators, and special guests who were involved with the various events. I’m also very sorry to this year’s IndieLand sponsor. Their team was incredibly supportive, and were a great partner to work with. Most importantly, I want to apologize to anyone who ever donated over the years, who felt they were wronged, or led astray by any of this.

As so many have pointed out, here Jirard is not apologizing for misleading donors, but rather for the fact some donors “felt” they were misled. But again, whatever, in isolation I can chalk that up to lawyer intervention.

Then at 4:20, Jirard does the only smart thing he’s done since this fiasco started: He announces that he will no longer be affiliated with OHF, and that he won’t be involved in any charity fundraising or money-handling if the IndieLand event does continue:

As the Open Hand Foundation board is currently restructuring, I’m taking this time to step away from my role as a board member. I am no longer a part of the Open Hand Foundation. For the foreseeable future, should the event continue, IndieLand will solely be focused on highlighting indie games. There will be no charity component. I love helping the indie-game community and working with developers, and if there are developers out there who want me to play their games, I would be honored to continue to do so.

Hmmm, it sounds like he’s really hoping he gets to continue his personal project where he’s the center of attention and acclamation. But you know, maybe it would have been better to leave that self-serving offer for another time.

THE WRONG RECEIPTS

Honestly, while there are some quibbles to be had with these opening remarks, the essence of the video up to this point would have been a sufficient apology. “We finally donated the money, I’m sorry it took so long, and I’m sorry I said things that weren’t true. Also, I don’t know anything about the golf stuff, so you’ll have to ask the people who do.” Sure, Jirard tries to spin things to save face, but to some degree you have to expect that sort of thing. If Jirard had simply ended this video at that point, I believe most people would be moving on from this, and I know I would not be writing this criticism.

However, at this point, Jirard says he’s going to begin addressing specific allegations, which Jirard warns the viewer will be “dry and complicated”. And here’s where the real manipulation begins. Jirard begins addressing things that nobody (at least, nobody reasonable) was inquiring about. These are presented as if they are rebuttals and refutations of the criticisms discussed by Karl and Muta, who he refers to only as “the accusers”. Clips from their videos are used as framing for Jirard’s responses.

First, Jirard publishes a redacted copy of his mother’s autopsy report, from University of California San Francisco. This may seem like an intrusion of privacy, which is probably why nobody reasonable was asking for this. I didn’t mention Jirard’s mother in my previous update, since that would only distract from the core questions at issue, which were:

• What statements did Jirard make about donations?
• Were those claims used to elicit more donations?
• Were those statements true?
• Did Jirard know those statements to be untrue?

Discussions of how Jirard’s mother died, his memory of her, how her condition inspired their family to start the Open Hand Foundation, etc. only serve to distract from those questions. All this line of discussion can do is manipulate people into having different conversations by appealing to sympathies. Even worse, framing the publication of an autopsy report as if it were a meaningful rebuttal makes his critics sound totally invasive and unreasonable. (Gosh, I hope that’s not what he was trying to do!)

Jirard discusses the difference between private and public charities, while claiming that OHF essentially had to file as both for a period of 60 months while transitioning to a public foundation. Interestingly, the links with Jirard’s video description only offer paperwork showing that the transition was filed, and do not include the concluding paperwork. This seems to be an attempt to address a very minor, circumstantial point raised previously, that the filing seems to be technically improper or that OHF may have had a legal obligation to use some minimal amount of its donations or assets in a charitable manner. But this still has nothing to do with the crux of the criticism.

Jirard also includes paperwork for an audit for the tax period ending in December 2014. Literally the entirety of the provided document is this:

Glad that clears things up!

Worth noting is that, while Jirard refers to this audit as “randomized” (at about 8:40), the date printed on the document – April 12, 2016 – places this one month after OHF filed for a change to a public charity. It would appear just as likely that this was a routine audit related to that petition to change status, and not some sort of hardball investigation into suspected malfeasance. But of course, that’s just speculation. More importantly, an audit of the tax year 2014 doesn’t exactly clear up anything relating to donations made through IndieLand from 2018 forward, now does it?

Jirard then discusses the differences between restricted and unrestricted donations, before reiterating (at 9:40) that the desire for a restricted donation was what took so long:

The Open Hand Foundation raised funds in an unrestricted manner, with the intention to restrict a larger donation toward dementia research. Larger restricted donations ensure clear measures and direction, but can take time, whereas unrestricted donations are often instantaneous and not tracked. This is one of the big reasons as to why the donation took so long. The organization did not raise enough money to make the impact that would allow the funds to be restricted and avoid those high admin costs.

But again, this conflicts with what we were told. Sure, maybe the “time” he says it took refers to the one year since Jirard the director claims he discovered the money was just sitting around, but it’s framed as though it also addresses the several prior years of inaction. And if this does refer to just the one year, why did Jirard continue making misleading statements during that time? Also, why is the money sufficient for a restricted donation now when that same amount was insufficient before? Why can’t we just have clarity, and why does Jirard feel the need to keep rationalizing these actions he claims to be apologizing for?

Around 11:00, Jirard gives exact figures for IndieLand 2023, while making a stunning admission:

Adding the $15,000 sponsorship donation to the initial estimate income for IndieLand 2023, equates to $76,333.33. This does not include merchandise, bits, or subscriptions from Twitch. However, there were real production costs when it comes to running this event. We paid for flights, hotels, appearance fees, supplies, food and catering, costs of good for merchandise, et cetera. All of that totaled just under $12,000. This is still an outstanding invoice, as not everything has been received or paid yet. Income from Twitch subscriptions and bits, along with merchandise, have offset some of the production costs. So to say the money is missing is simply wrong.

Noteworthy is that none of the claims made against OHF had anything to do with IndieLand 2023. This is because this all originated with the examination of tax filings, which only reflect years up to 2022. Nobody had any basis for saying any of that money is missing, which is why that was not said. Glad we straightened out that thing no one was alleging!

And yet, this passage is still incredibly damning. Jirard assured donors many times during IndieLand streams that all of this incidental income – Twitch bits, subs, merchandise, etc. – would all go directly to OHF:

All bits, all donations, all superchats, all YouTube memberships, basically anything that’s tied to donating or subscribing in a financial way to us is going to charity. We’re not touching any of it. It’s all going for a good cause.

You can buy the IndieLand t-shirt right now on pre-order, if you aren’t on Twitch or YouTube. You can spend your Amazon Prime gift subs, YouTube memberships and subscriptions, all that stuff, all the fundraising stuff that happens throughout the weekend will be added at the end of the stream.

You’ve got… bits and subs on Twitch, memberships, superchats on YouTube, all goes to the cause. If you want to buy an IndieLand t-shirt, you can totally do that. And for the folks who are in attendance, you can actually go buy one in the lobby. So please go do that. All the proceeds and all those things do go to charity. We don’t touch any of it.

As a reminder guys, all bits, subs, donations, Amazon Prime or Prime Gaming subs, and t-shirt sales all go to charity, so we… we touch none of it, it all goes for a good cause.

This is the entire problem, all over again. You can’t just lie and say “These donations are going to charity” when they’re not. Sure, Jirard’s diehard fans might be okay with him spending that money on something else which they consider to be adjacent enough with the original premise, and thus they may be inclined to forgive this misrepresentation from a content creator they enjoy. But do those diehards speak for everyone who dropped bits and subs into the IndieLand chat? Do those others not have a right to know the truth?

Earlier in the video, Jirard had already handwaved away responsibility for the golf tournament revenue, and if he indeed was not responsible for that fiasco, that’s fine. (That’s setting aside his role as OHF director, of course.) However, at this point he returns to that topic, as if to defend actions he suggested he was not responsible for. Jirard describes ways in which the golf revenue was below expectations, or was rolled over to future events during the pandemic. However, this still fails to address the actual point being made, which was that none of the golf revenue seems to be reflected in the filings. Jirard also throws out a bunch more numbers and lists various expenses, similar to the costs Jirard listed for IndieLand). But as The Certified Gaming Accountant points out, these should be listed on the public tax filings as expenses, and not simply deducted from “gross revenue”, as they appear to be.

If Jirard is uninvolved with the golf event as he claims, then surely he’s getting this information from somewhere. Once again, if this was an innocent error, it could be cleared up with access to the relevant paperwork, which we aren’t allowed to see for ourselves. Does he think serious implications of charity fraud can be responded to with a sharp “Nuh-uh”? Jirard tells viewers his accusers are operating using “bad math” and “missing information”, while apparently hoping they don’t notice his own role in that information going missing.

This portion of the video concludes with Jirard asserting that nothing untoward had been committed by himself or his family, at 15:50:

None of the money from the Open Hand Foundation has ever funded any of my projects for my company. I want to stress that not a dollar raised from IndieLand and its supporters was ever used on anything to personally benefit me, my family, or any of our companies. We never touched this money, nor ever moved it. As evidence in the public documents, no one at the foundation has ever drawn a salary.

Except just a moment ago he went on record that he spent the subs and bits and merch on event expenses. Does he think that doesn’t count as “money from the Open Hand Foundation” since it was never forwarded to OHF as was promised? Or does he not count those dollars as “raised from IndieLand and its supporters”? Maybe if he’d gone a bit lighter on this assurance, it would be technically correct, but he definitely “touched” that money in any reasonable sense of the word.

THAT ESCALATED QUICKLY

Even with all of this, I’d be inclined to let other, more monetized outlets make these same points, and stick to spending my free time writing about topics where I felt I had something important to add to the conversation (or, you know, actually playing video games). Of course, Jirard is going to try to save face. Obviously he’s trying to appeal to his loyal fans, who are the only people he’s going to win back at this point. As with Billy Mitchell, if people insist on falling for Jirard’s manipulation tactics and aren’t interested in reviewing the evidence against him, there’s not much more I can do to stop them from being willful suckers.

However, the latter portion of Jirard’s “response” took a very dark turn – one which simply cannot go unchallenged. At 16:20, he begins getting visibly angry when categorically denying allegations of wrongdoing on the part of himself or his family:

Saying that we are fraudsters, that what we are doing is illegal, and constitutes charity fraud, that we are using my dead mother’s name to potentially embezzle money and steal, is categorically false. I should have been more transparent about the money not being donated, and that’s on me. But my family and I have not done anything illegal, not before then, and not since. And as mentioned previously, we have correspondence from the IRS to prove that.

Remember kids, if you clear an IRS audit in 2016, after that you’re free to do all the crime you want!

If Jirard wants to assert that he’s done nothing wrong, okay, he can assert that. That’s fine. But we have no real evidence in his favor. It’s perfectly understandable for people to be skeptical without proof, and no amount of righteous indignation should change that. You don’t get to run a charity and then hide all your books, and then act like the people asking questions about known and demonstrable inconsistencies are malicious for doing so.

Also, once again an invocation of the loss of Jirard’s mother. I’m not the least bit interested in accusing Jirard or the Khalil family of misusing their deceased loved one’s name. For one thing, it’s just another distraction. Also, the starving optimist in me would like to think the Khalils wouldn’t be such terrible people as to knowingly summon her memory for some sort of premeditated pathological scam. But I also know that there definitely do exist awful people in this world who don’t hesitate to cynically exploit a loved one’s memory for personal gain.

Oh, but Jirard’s aggravation is far from over! As heard at 16:40, he and his family are taking these “allegations” very seriously. They’ve lawyered up, and are currently looking toward their “next steps”:

Furthermore, my family and I are in serious conversations with our legal teams regarding next steps, as the allegations that have been made have been made with complete disregard for the truth of the matter. These allegations were made by individuals who self-admittedly aren’t even financial or legal professionals. These allegations are slanderous, and we believe were done with selfish intent. They have directly jeopardized the safety of me, my staff, and my family, and that is not okay.

Everybody understood this as what it was: A direct legal threat against Karl and Muta for their reporting into the Khalil family charity fraud. And Jirard isn’t the only member of the family conveying these threats:

Above is a screenshot of comments from Reddit user “jkhalil” – Jirard’s brother, Jacque Khalil. Lest one think Jacque is just dropping in for familial support, Jacque’s name appears alongside Jirard’s on Open Hand Foundation paperwork, with Jacque’s title identified as “Vice President”. As of my writing this, Jacque’s Reddit profile page no longer shows any of his comments in r/TheCompletionist, which could possibly reflect a deletion of his activity, or could be the result of that subreddit’s current private status. However, the above interaction can be confirmed across two captures on Internet Archive. A Discord user also provided different screenshots allegedly taken from a pro-Completionist Discord channel showing Jacque similarly gloating and declaring “Now my work really begins”.

I guess following through on his charity’s promises was not his “real” work?

Getting back to the video, at 17:10, Jirard does the typical retaliatory liar tactic of reframing the accusations against him in the most over-the-top manner, so as to paint his critics as completely unreasonable:

I want to reiterate and specifically address that both the Foundation and I have been accused of forgery, embezzlement, and charity fraud. The allegations imply the Foundation forged tax returns because there weren’t physically signatures on them when we e-filed them, or that we altered numbers to hide income or expenses.

Wait wait wait, “FORGERY”!? Karl merely remarked that the tax filings as made available didn’t appear to be properly signed, which in retrospect was completely normal when using an e-signature. It was also a throwaway remark, and totally unrelated to the actual matter of the missing money. And now, somehow, that’s an “[accusation] of forgery”?

Jirard never does show us OHF’s actual financial records, which is a bit odd, since they would clear up so many of these matters right away. But at 17:30, he does declare that “we” (whoever “we” refers to) are ready for an expected audit, while suggesting those filing complaints to the IRS were “instructed” to do so:

We can account for every single dollar received and spent in the last nine years. We do not have anything to hide. And due to the overwhelming amount of people who have been instructed to file complaints to the IRS and the Department of Justice, we understand an audit may be coming. And we welcome it. Our legal and financial teams have assured us that we have done nothing criminally wrong or illegal. Any possible issues in our paperwork can only be described as clerical errors, and are easily amendable.

Ah, well nobody who confidently declares they have nothing to hide would ever have anything to hide… right?

Also, at various points in the video, Jirard recalls various monetary figures down to the penny. Either these numbers are just outright lies – a possibility that at this point I can’t discount – or whoever wrote his script has drawn those numbers from QuickBooks or similar software. So again, why can’t we just see these records for ourselves? It’s not like we’re taking about a private business full of proprietary secrets; this is supposedly a public charity which should be accountable to its donors. If they have nothing to hide, then why are the records which would prove their innocence still being hidden?

Lastly, at 18:00, before another story about his mother, Jirard once again paints an illustration of himself as the victim of the court of public opinion run amok:

Content creators and influencers should be held accountable when faced with serious allegations. However, the narrative can get taken so far away from the truth that the court of public opinion supersedes fact. I recognize and take accountability for all of my actions. At the same time, I am not going to let my reputation be compromised by allegations that are not true. I own up to my part in this, but I will not be painted as someone who is a con-artist and embezzler. I won’t be someone whose name gets tarnished without putting up a fight. I owe it to my friends, my family, and myself, to stand up to this situation right now.

ARE THESE JOKERS FOR REAL?

As mentioned earlier, the video enjoyed an initial wave of support from Jirard’s loyalists, eager to have a statement from him to pin their faith on. The positive replies to the YouTube video are a bit hard to find when sorting by either “Top comments” or “Newest first”, but they are there. Of course, the negative comments all float to the top, even after a few rounds of curation have deleted previous waves of criticism:

It’s easier to find this initial burst of support on other social media, like Twitter, by searching within a timeframe for words like “Jirard” and “receipts”:

I mean, I guess you could say Jirard brought “receipts” of a sort, but they certainly didn’t address the actual claims being made against him. He provided a few links to the recent AFTD announcement of the recent $600k donation, his mother’s autopsy report, OHF’s petition to change to a public charity, and that single page from the IRS audit in 2016. Literally every other link was just public information about charities in general.

None of this had to do with the core issues of concern: Was Jirard intentionally lying to solicit donations, and has all the money supposedly donated specifically to OHF been accounted for? Jirard is more like the guy holding up the line at the department store; sure, he has a bunch of receipts, but none of them are for the heavily worn shoes he’s trying to return.

Obviously, Jirard was trying to appeal to his diehard fans, who are only involved because they enjoy his comedic videos and who aren’t truly evaluating the weight of the evidence. To summarize his messaging, “I’m angry and indignant at these baseless accusations against me, and so you should be angry and indignant, too.” I would have to guess that the reason he’s not trying to appeal those of us who actually review and evaluate the evidence is because there must be some truth to the questions raised about things like the golf event revenue. But as long as he waves a stack of papers and claims it’s the evidence that proves his innocence, that’s all his fans need.

The narrative being pushed is a cynical invocation of concerns over “YouTube drama merchants” and “cancel culture run amok”. As if serious reporting and investigation of valid questions about a public charity is “drama”, or that the only reason one would have to bring these questions to the public is to gain personal prestige. Thus, the entire dynamic gets flipped. And since Jirard apparently cannot satisfy the public’s questions, he can then look to those remaining fans and say “I tried to reason with the angry mob, but there’s just no getting through to them.”

You can see the eagerness to stand by Jirard in the post “My Final Say and Moderation Decisions”, by one of the moderators at r/TheCompletionist. This moderator expressed fatigue at defending Jirard, who in their words was “accused of a crime [he] did not commit”. The mod then proudly declared that Jirard’s video would be the final word on the topic in that subreddit, “regardless of if another channel releases a new video on this topic”. (And yes, as they noted, “That includes Karl or Muta”.)

You can imagine how well that went over with folks. Not long afterward, the entire r/TheCompletionist subreddit was set to private, where it remains as of my writing this. Thankfully, folks set up r/TheCompletionist2 to continue the conversation.

But of course, the most asinine aspect of all of this – the reason I felt compelled to speak up here – was the thinly veiled threat of retaliatory litigation, originating from Jirard and echoed by his brother Jacque. While I was willing to set aside bits of lawyer-sculpted language, such as that Jirard’s statements about donations were “potentially implying” things that were blatantly untrue, this changes entirely if the reason for that phrase-crafting was not diffusion of legal liability on defense, but rather to improve their positioning on the offensive.

At the end of the day, even if particular items such as the missing signature can be explained, the important issues being raised were important, and deserved answers. Let’s say, hypothetically, Jirard still had some sort of magic answer for everything, such as:

For years, we’ve actually been running a second charity, also called the Open Hand Foundation. Here’s all the books for that charity, accounting for all the missing golf revenue and everything. And the reason I didn’t bring this up during my call with Karl and Muta was because I had just suffered a head injury. And the reason I made untrue statements about Twitch subs and merch was because, each time it came up, someone was holding my dog hostage just off-camera. And the other untrue statements were made by an impostor, which I can also prove definitively.

Okay? Even if all of that was true, that still wouldn’t mean Karl or Muta did anything wrong, or that they should be sued for covering the story! These were all valid questions, which deserved answers. After all the time Jirard had to prepare his “response”, the lack of relevant documentation accompanying it demonstrates a disdain for the community who deserves to know what’s being done with the hard-earned money they trusted him with. Does Jirard believe he’s not obligated to prove anything?

I’m curious to know what kind of world Jirard, and his remaining loyalists cheering him on, want to live in? One where journalists are afraid to draw attention to blatant scams, because maybe they might get sued over some minor misreported detail? Again, Jirard ultimately had to admit that the charity money wasn’t used as promised. Are the Khalil family hoping to dissuade others from covering this story? Are they on the side of the trusting public, or on the side of fake charity swindlers hoping to dissuade inspection of their facades? This misplaced focus and lack of contrition tells me Jirard is not nearly as sorry for his actions as he is angry at those who caught him.

I also can’t help but think of how this threat comes in the context of Karl’s well known and ongoing legal battle with Donkey Kong cheater Billy Mitchell. Do the Khalil family believe Karl is vulnerable and unable to defend himself on two fronts at once? Do they have eyes on using Billy’s baseless lawsuit to their advantage while hoping to leverage their own attempt to punish Karl for his journalism? Are we seeing the moment Jirard and Billy come together along with all the other psychos and liars to form gaming’s version of the Legion of Doom?

While I had fun half-assedly assembling the above depiction of gaming’s rogues gallery, I was also struck by how tragic this particular story is. Most of those other liars and cheaters and con-artists were exposed because they were making claims they weren’t capable of fulfilling (at least, not without more sacrifices than they were unwilling to make). Jirard had anything any gamer would want. He had industry connections. He had his own streaming marathon events. He had a loyal fanbase. He was placed into a notable indie game. And none of his assurances were outlandish. All he had to do to keep all of that, was follow through on what he promised. But of course, that assumes OHF and its “charity” campaigns were not a deliberate front for corrupt conduct, which at this point we’ll never be sure of until the completion of a full audit (pun always intended).

And of course, the tragedy extends far beyond Jirard’s personal life narrative. As I already noted in my last update, Jirard’s conduct of eliciting donations under false pretenses “undermines alternative charitable foundations attempting to conduct themselves honestly, and erodes trust in the charity ecosystem in general.” This “apology” magnifies these concerns tenfold. Are the missing funds being used to prepare these legal threats? Will people be afraid to donate to gaming charity marathons going forward? Regardless of what happens with the money now, Jirard has selfishly and deliberately poisoned that well, all for his personal gain.

The situation continues to elicit disappointed responses from across gaming social media. As I was finishing this write-up, it was obliquely announced that the “Jirard” character would soon be patched out of indie game Sea of Stars. And of course, both Karl Jobst and Mutahar held nothing back when threatened with legal retaliation:

Of course, there’s no chance a lawsuit against either Karl or Muta in this case would win. And I’d hope the Khalils aren’t crazy enough to try. Also, these threats are already backfiring, as they seem to be the primary focus of the negative public reaction to Jirard’s “response”. But threats like these must be opposed nonetheless. What the Khalils are doing, and have done, is wrong. I don’t expect them to offer a genuine apology to the community at this point, but at the very least, they need to stop, or to be stopped.

WHAT I WANTED TO SEE

This is certainly not the first time a YouTube “apology” from an Internet celebrity was warmly received by the true believers and resoundingly rejected by everyone else. Whenever this happens, you often hear people say something to the effect that a “good apology” does not exist. What this cynical remark means is, no matter how “good” an apology is, what the detractors really want is blood, and so they’ll pick this “good apology” apart for everything they can use to justify being upset about.

However, I’ve always been skeptical of this sentiment. Granted, an apology is already an uphill climb, since you’re starting from the position of “I fucked up so badly that this statement is necessary”. But I’ve definitely seen and heard good apologies from others. And while I may not have the same level of scrutiny on my actions that a YouTube content creator with a sizeable following does, I have screwed up and had to apologize for things, and was told (both through words and actions) that my apology was good. (Tip: If your actions were materially wrong, even if not maliciously so, then you have to set aside your pride and eat a little shit for what you did, which some people are unwilling to do.) Of course, the Internet does make things more complicated; apology trolls are very real, and can make it difficult to admit fault in anything. But I believe the fundamental problem isn’t that “there is no good apology”, but rather that the people typically being put in the position of making public apologies are often not genuinely remorseful for what they did, which was why they committed those actions in the first place. And despite their efforts at damage control, that lack of remorse comes through. I do believe reasonable people who don’t care about the personalities behind a controversy are willing to recognize a good apology when it does happen.

Sometimes, I wish these fools would let me write their apologies for them. You want to come across as remorseful? Fine. You want to also use the platform to respond to things you think were untrue? Also fine. But you have to make sure people walk away from your “response” knowing which of those was more important to you, which for starters means reflecting personally on why you want this video to be made. (Of course, this reflection is the part selfish pricks struggle with.)

As an example, try this apology on for size:

During many IndieLand streams, I made repeated statements suggesting that recipients of the donated funds had already been chosen, and even that the money was already being put to use furthering dementia research. I’m sorry to say, those statements were untrue, and I should not have made them. I deeply regret my actions. While this is not about my feelings, I’m admittedly crestfallen, knowing how my actions may have caused other families to endure the hardships ours has. If there were anything I could do to satisfactorily undo that harm today, I would do it. The only thing I can do now to make this up to the community I love, the community who has treated me so well for so many years, is to be as honest and transparent as possible, which I have resolved to do from this point forward. To that end, I’m helping ensure the Open Hand Foundation makes public every available financial record in its possession, with only minor privacy-related redactions. The money you gave to fight dementia will go to where it should have gone. Furthermore, I’m currently looking into ways to increase those funds at my own personal expense, to address concerns over things like devaluation to inflation. Again, this does not make right the poor decisions I have made in the past. This is merely what I am able to do now to rectify these wrongs as much as possible.

Before I proceed, I’m aware that some in my community have expressed anger towards the people who helped bring this situation to light. I want to be absolutely clear that I hold Karl Jobst and Mutahar completely blameless. While their reporting was not without minor, understandable inaccuracies, they were correct to question my handling of Open Hand Foundation charity funds, and were correct to bring their questions to the public when they did. The recent donation to AFTD was made thanks to them, not to me. If you consider yourself a fan of me and my work, and you’re blaming them for this fiasco, I ask you to please stop. I am the only one to blame for all of this.

With that said, I do strongly disagree with a few of the more serious allegations made by others. Since I do not wish to continue making a series of response videos, I’m going to briefly address a few of those characterizations here. It is your choice whether to believe me, but I hope to provide as much evidence as I can.

And from there, Jirard could’ve talked about claims of embezzlement or whatever levied by anonymous online randos. Of course, it would be difficult to have such a discussion if he really did commit embezzlement. Perhaps the reason his “apology” was so lousy is because he knows he really has committed crimes beyond what simple words could fix? At any rate, once he’d addressed the details he wanted to clear up, he could’ve sprinkled in assurances that he will no longer ever be involved in handling of or campaigning for charity money, then finally circle back around to the focus of his apology, which should be his own responsibility for what he did wrong.

The part about explicitly holding Karl and Muta blameless, and thanking them for ensuring action was taken on the accumulated funds, is possibly the most important part of that hypothetical apology. Sure, it’s more words, but it’s a way of putting “I take responsibility” into action. It’s demonstrating that any “YouTube drama” that may have spun off from this situation is strictly a result of one’s own actions, and not the fault of those who called those actions out. But instead, it seems Jirard was more interested in actively fanning those flames as a way of getting his gullible followers to be angry at someone else.

Many people do this silly thing where they claim to hate “controversy” (or in this case, “YouTube drama”) while enabling the exact people whose actions are causing the controversy they claim to hate. This happened with Billy Mitchell, too. Gaming organizers allowed him back into their spaces because they didn’t want to “take sides”, completely oblivious to the fact that including him necessarily means excluding others. It shouldn’t go without saying that Billy was also very charismatic, manipulative, and well-connected, and that excluding him could mean paying a price these organizers did not want to sacrifice. Thus, one would have grounds to assume the real reason for this sort of fake “neutrality” was not an ethical one but a selfish one. Either way, we’re left with a niche of gamers – the same ones who see a stack of papers and hear confident declarations of righteousness and think this constitutes “proof” of anything the bearer asserts – who decry “YouTube drama” while actively and obliviously cultivating it.

Obviously, that hypothetical apology I would have wanted is off the table now. Thanks to Jirard’s own actions, this situation has escalated well beyond anything mere words can fix. And at this point, I don’t expect Jirard or his idiot brother to be thanking Karl and Muta for their reporting any time soon, lmao.

Jirard and his remaining apologists may choose to keep living in their own little fantasy world. But those of us living in the real world have to take real consequences seriously. I oppose charity fraud. I deal in actual evidence, not assurances or sleights of hand. I have no interest in baseless drama between YouTubers, but I absolutely despise retaliatory lawsuits meant to silence valid journalism or criticism. And that’s why I felt compelled to speak up on this “controversy”, yet again. I want to be clear that I don’t wish personal harm upon Jirard, even with his awful behavior thus far. But if Jirard Khalil ever wants to be part of the gaming community again, if that’s even possible at this point, he needs to grow up and clean up his act, beginning immediately. (And that may involve no longer listening to his sketchy, dipshit family, who are obviously giving him terrible advice.) Otherwise, if he’s not interested in changing his behavior, he can do what Billy Mitchell should have done, and fuck off somewhere else, where he and his lies can be someone else’s problem.