A YouTuber says he covered Hellraiser’s nude scenes with black boxes, but YouTube still wiped out his 190,000-subscriber channel overnight

A YouTuber claims he lost a decade of work overnight after YouTube permanently terminated his 190,000-subscriber channel. In a post on Instagram, Gamology shared that the creator, @xj0nathan, saw his channel vanish after uploading gameplay of Saber Interactive’s new release, Clive Barker’s Hellraiser: Revival.

According to the post, the creator covered the game’s story-critical nudity and sexual themes with black censorship boxes before uploading the footage to comply with YouTube’s rules. Despite this, the platform allegedly labeled it as sexually gratifying content and issued an immediate, lifetime ban. Additionally, the creator’s automated appeals were allegedly rejected in minutes.

Per Gamology, @xj0nathan said the deletion wiped out 10 years of work and his main source of income, adding that he had received “no warnings, no strikes, nothing.” He also shared that losing over 3,000 videos hit hard on a personal level, since they represented a significant part of his life.

Saber had already warned streamers about the game’s content

Gamology also claimed that uncensored footage of the same sequence remains live on other channels without any issue. In a slide, the page noted that Saber Interactive had previously cautioned players that the game lacks a built-in streamer mode.

As shown in an image in the post, Saber had warned streamers in a response on X, telling them to use age restrictions and sexual theme labels and to “adhere to each platform’s community guidelines.” YouTube’s side of the decision isn’t included in the post, and the account comes only from Gamology and @xj0nathan, so it can’t be independently verified.

Some in the community blamed YouTube’s reliance on automated moderation, with one user writing, “Human eyes, none to be found anymore.” Another argued that YouTube applies its rules unevenly, saying they had been demonetized over a Dark Souls video because their shouting at bosses was flagged as threatening.

YouTube typically enforces its Community Guidelines through a progressive, three-strike system designed to educate creators, per Audit Socials. Under this structure, a creator usually receives a one-time warning, followed by three strikes that carry increasingly severe consequences, such as upload restrictions, channel suspension, and termination. 

The system is reportedly meant to give creators a chance to learn from their mistakes, but YouTube explicitly reserves the right to bypass these steps for egregious violations. For instance, content involving terrorism or child exploitation can lead to immediate termination.

Audit Socials noted that YouTube’s automated detection systems, user reports, and manual reviews all play a role in how strikes are issued, whether the issue is misleading metadata, harmful content, or sexual material. Creators can check their status on the Channel Violations page in YouTube Studio.