Is YouTuber Kate Yup Dead?

On April 23, 2018, a video appeared on YouTube from a channel called Kate Yup with the following title:
11 lbs Salmon ! (5kg de saumon) INCREDIBLE - WORLD RECORD - ASMR [sic].

The fourteen minute video shows a possibly French and petite-sized woman consuming 11 pounds of raw salmon.

It's effin disgusting, in my opinion, but since the video’s release, it has spawned nearly 5 million views. A modest sum compared to her later videos, one reaching over 23 million.

Kate Yup's channel produces 'muckbang' content, which is eating shows that feature a person consuming large quantities of food, and occasionally interacting with their audience during the feasting. Muckbang content appeals mostly to an Asian audience, (especially South Korean) and if you don't understand 'K-Pop', you probably won't understand muckbang either.

Is Kate Yup okay?

The reason that Kate Yup is also true-crime and why I covered her story in one of my recent episodes is because for the last 2 years, she has been missing and possibly dead.

The conspiracy took off after another video was uploaded to her channel titled: 2 WHOLE FISH, WHOLE GIANT SQUIT, LOBSTER, KING CRAB, SALMON & TUNA RAW ,OCTOPUS, SCALLOP, SHRIMP [sic]

It was in this video that Kate Yup's audience noticed a cut on her lip and a large bruise above her left elbow.

Also, another Redditor noticed another bruise, mark, or blemish on her left shoulder.

Kate Yup attempts to explain her markings away by posting in the community section of her channel.

Viewers also noticed some odd events in the video:

1. At [5:37] Kate Yup is seen repeatedly tapping on the side of her bowl. Some theorist believe this could be an attempt at communicating S.O.S.
2. At [12:47] a male’s voice is heard saying "Kill, Kill" and "Eat Fast" (It's really hard to hear and maybe nothing, but Kate Yup does speed up her eating after this point.)
3. At [17:37] an annotation appears saying "The meat is So delicioOouS, soft and tender [sic]." I can't possibly see how this wasn't done intentionally to spell out S.O.S.

In another video, you can hear a male voice saying:

1. [11:30] someone says "hurry up"
2. [16:19] someone says "just eat"
3. [22:04] someone says "fast"
4. [23:16] someone says "just eat"

Kate Yup Pins a Comment

Kate Yup gained a lot of traffic from her last video I mentioned. However, that viewership also garnered a lot of concerns and conspiracy theorist asking about her health and wellbeing.

So she finally responded.

The post says the following:

"It's not morse code. That isn't even how morse code works. It is a series of short and long pulses. Even thinking outside of the box by assuming she is using one finger for long pulses and one finger for short pulses, she taps three fingers on the bowl. It is just random tapping, there is no correlation between her tapping and morse code, I couldn't identify a single letter.

Every other claim, aside from the bruises, is just silly. Why would a captor let her edit the videos? That doesn't even make sense. And if joe-youtuber could spot the SOS, so would they. And if she knew enough to use SOS as a call for help, why on earth wouldn't she have tapped that on the bowl?!? [... --- ...] It's the only morse code I have memorized. Also, the bowl moves (so what?) because her other hand is resting on it. It moves perfectly with the rest of her body. Finally, her lip does not look busted, it's either a cold sore (which would explain it showing up more than once) or a bad blemish."

Is Kate Yup a Captive?

The channel’s post left more questions than answers and sort of 'fueled the fire' leading conspiracy theorist to imagine all kinds of nefarious scenarios involving Kate Yup. The most popular of these theories is that she is a captive being forced to eat to make money for her captor(s).

Keep in mind that nobody knows where she is producing these videos from. She could be anywhere in the world, living or dead.

She responds again to her audience's concerns. However, her video is like accelerant to an already blazing fire.

She included the following annotations in her "I AM ALIVE" video.

1. Hey !! I'm still alive my friends, you can see to my smile ...
2. Everything is okay for me !
3. Look at me, are you really thinking i am forced to eat ?
4. Prawn, just smaller than gian shrimps and easier to eat cause i removed the skin

Binging and Purging

Another theory is that Kate Yup has a severe eating disorder. Food purgers often have identifying side effects, such as the rotting and falling out of teeth.

In a video uploaded, but since being removed, Kate Yup's teeth fell from her mouth as she was completing her muckbang meal. At the time of this video being removed, it had already achieved 17 million views.

There are many people who believe that Kate Yup has an eating disorder such as binging and purging her food. Looking closely at her videos, you can notice that there are constant cuts to her fingers, which may reveal that she is purging (the cuts being caused by her skin scraping her teeth).

Another Redditor points out that her eyes are constantly watering, which gives her the impression that Kate Yup is pausing between bites to throw up her meal.

Kate Yup is a UFC fighter

One comical theory posted was that Kate Yup was really a UFC fighter named Joanna Jedrzejczyk, because of her "identical smile" and her broken English. Joanna has publically explained that she is not Kate Yup, but gets asked about it a lot.

Kate Yup is Karlie Guse

Another ludicrous theory is that Kate Yup is actually missing girl Karlie Guse, but this would be a literal impossibility. Karlie went missing in October 2018, which was 6 months after Kate Yup uploaded her first video in April of that same year.

Karlie was gone, but Yup kept uploading.

Plus Karlie Guse is from California and has an American accent, not a French-sounding one.

Is Kate Yup Dead?

Not only do we not know if Kate Yup is dead or alive, but we also can't be sure that her entire channel was produced as an elaborate hoax. A hoax that has profitably monetized its path to god-knows-how-much advertising revenue by now.

Many of her Youtube commenters plead for welfare checks on this mysterious woman, but these are unreasonable appeals. Who would 'they' check on? Where would they check on this person at? Is this person even in danger?

For all we know, Kate Yup is sailing her yacht across the Bahamas as we speak… or perhaps found a permanent home at the bottom of the sea floor.

*If you are interested in diving deeper in the story of Kate Yup, I recommend Toria Kinlove's YouTube channel.