Vine Star Attempts to Justify Homophobic Video

Nash Grier, the most followed person on Vine, found himself in the center of a storm of controversy last year after a 6-second video he made went viral in which he claimed HIV was a "Fag" thing. Since then the 16-year-old internet sensation apologized for the video in a long note via his social media accounts, saying he was sorry for "anything negative I've said towards gays" and that he has "nothing against anyone or anything that promotes equality."

In a new op-ed for The Huffington Post titled "Here's the Full Story About the Vine I Made," Grier apologizes once again and attempts to justify the video he made by claiming he filmed it while he was a sheltered freshman at "a small private school in North Carolina" living "a very excluded and lonely life."

"I had almost 1,200 followers on Vine and I posted six-second video on HIV/AIDS, using a very offensive term ("fag")," he writes. "The next day, I went to school and I received so many responses as to how funny the video was. At this point, what I thought I had done wasn't just okay, but I thought it was funny."

He claims, "I didn't know the meaning behind what I was saying when I made the video. I didn't know the people I was hurting."

Grier goes on to explain as his popularity exploded on the video sharing app and people saw the hateful video he had filmed, he "began getting death threats, was called 'homophobic' and a 'hate monger,' when in reality, it was the farthest thing from true" and notes that "many of my early Vines and collaborations were with gay people. I never once had a problem with someone's sexuality or sexual preference."

However, Grier's history on Twitter paints a different picture. New Now Next has posted screenshots from his Twitter account (pictured below) showing the social media star has had a very long and public habit of using gay slurs and speaking out against marriage equality.