Shaun King's A Real One clothing is... not real? 👀🍿🧃
Which isn't at all surprising...
I was late-night doomscrolling and came across some tweets by Ashley Ray, a TV writer, comedian, and host of the TV, I Say podcast about activist Shaun King allegedly pulling a fast one on his followers (again…).
For those unfamiliar with Shaun King— or worse, familiar with and still sharing his content— definitely look into his horrendously bad track record of scamming.
If you’re a reader: check out this Daily Beast article. As Kali Holloway wrote, King has “long-standing accusations—primarily lodged by black women and queer folks, nearly all of whom are his former co-organizers, colleagues, employees, and supporters—that King has inflated, mismanaged, or failed to account for funds he’s raised for various social-justice causes.“
If you’re more into podcasts: Tune into the Scam Queen’s podcast where host Laci Mosley interviews Ashley Ray about Shaun King
TL;DR: Shaun King’s not a good dude, don’t repost his content. Instead, amplify true Black activists and authors— some suggestions can be in the Scam Queen’s episode description and in this Motherly list here!
Okay! So, now that you’re caught up on the history of Shaun’s scams, back to Ashley’s Twitter thread:
As Ashley mentions, Shaun launched A Real One, his apparel line, back in September of last year. which includes $65 t-shirts and $165 hoodies (some with Shaun’s face on them). The responses were… skeptical.
Oh No They Didn’t! also called A Real One Out for using an uncredited image in their promo materials— from a vendor they apparently weren’t actually associated with.
Now— eight months after the clothing line launch, while the website is still live and accepting orders, the A Real One’s Instagram hasn’t been updated since September 27th of last year when there was a video posted of one of the vendors “working around the clock” on the shirts.
And based on the amount of comments on the video and the other posts on the Instagram account, almost no one has received their orders. Sounds like a story we’ve heard before… ahem— The CEH.
Comments on these posts include:
“i see @shaunking left this brand in 2021 with what was left of his career”
“I’ve ordered mine bAck in October I’m YET to receive it ….I’ve sent msgs to you with no reply @arealone @shaunking”
“Order 3710. No one is emailing back. Ordered in Dec. Still hasn’t shipped. Can anyone help?”
“how do I get an update on my order? it never shipped and nobody is responding to any of my emails.”
Unsurprisingly because Ashley did that interview about Shaun King on the Scam Goddess podcast (a GREAT podcast to throw into your rotation if you’re a scamdal fan), she’d been blocked from Shaun King’s and A Real One’s Instagram— which seems to be Shaun’s MO with folks that critique him.
Ashley Ray also tweeted Broken Traditions’ video which lays out the proof it seems unlikely his clothing brand is legit.
We’ve reached out to Shaun King and the Philadelphia clothing vendor he mentioned working with for comment and will update this article if we hear back… but we’re also not holding our breath.