The internet’s answer to a real-life Snow White, Kelvin Peña, who goes by the name Brother Nature, has become a social media sensation for his widely shared wildlife videos.
Peña, 20, counts nearly 4 million followers across Instagram and Twitter who regularly check in to see him get up close and personal with his menagerie of “pets,” including his beloved doe Canela, chimpanzees, squirrel monkeys and goats.
But like many other viral figures of 2018, his prefame internet activity has come back to bite him ― unlike any of the animals in his videos ― when racist, sexist and anti-Semitic tweets from his account resurfaced over the weekend.
The tweets, which date from 2011 and 2012, when Peña was about 12 years old, are worse than your average Twitter scandal, with the nature enthusiast writing messages like “HEIL HITLER” with a swastika and “f**k that, I’m Hitler. Everyone’s a f**king Nazi.”
Peña, who is of Dominican and Puerto Rican descent, also posted a slew of anti-black sentiments, such as “Jay Z look like a monkey” and “I hate coons dammit.”
As a teenager, he appeared to idolize singer Chris Brown and expressed some serious disdain for women.
“When I grow up I wanna be like Chris Brown. So if my girlfriend tried to look through my phone while driving I can choke and punch her :D,” he wrote in one tweet.
“Wanna hear a joke? Women’s rights,” another tweet reads.
Peña has since made his Twitter account @COLDGAMEKELV private and issued an apology for his behavior on Sunday, explaining that his younger self was “impressionable” and “seeking attention.”
“I am sorry to all of the people that I offended and have let down. I apologize for 12 year old Kelvin and take total responsibility for my words,” he wrote. “Everyone changes, everyone learns, and everyone makes mistakes.”
He went on to explain that he has “evolved as a human being” since posting the tweets and has made it his mission to “lead with love.”
“I was a child and am now a man asking you to accept the apology of a young boy,” he concluded.
Some of his fans on social media denounced Peña for the offensive tweets, while others expressed some sympathy, given his age when he posted them.