A year-long saga that began when one of Australia’s most popular YouTubers threw a doughnut on the floor has erupted overnight, with two influencers posting lengthy videos attacking each other amid claims of “Islamophobia”.
Former criminal turned social media and food truck sensation Anthony Lees – aka Spanian – broke his silence on the beef, claiming he had “held his tongue” during 12 months of criticism.
The 41 year old said he had been accused of “Islamophobia” over a video he made three years ago in which he travelled around Sydney in a quest to find the city’s best doughnuts.
One moment in the YouTube video appears to have rubbed some up the wrong way.
In the video he buys a doughnut from a highly popular shop in the city’s southwest called L.A Donuts, which is owned by Muslim comedian Frida Deguise.
In the clip he admits he “just doesn’t like doughnuts, they’re just rubbish” before loudly chewing on the doughnut and throwing it on the floor.
“I’m just sick of it. I didn’t even want to chew it,” he said. “I didn’t like that doughnut as you can tell. That doughnut was just dry. It tasted like nothing.”
In a video posted overnight, Spanian claimed he had been attacked by Muslim influencers over the video for months on end, calling him disrespectful and Islamophobic.
He stressed he didn’t even know the L.A Donuts owner was Muslim, before rattling off a string of other Muslim-owned businesses he had shouted out in previous videos.
“What about when I went to the Ramadan markets and absolutely glazed there and all the Christians are saying, ‘Why are you going there? You don’t do anything Christian.’ I’m saying, ‘Who cares, bro? I’ll go where I want’. “ he said. “What about that? What about when I’ve done Sydney’s best kebab… and I went to the Indian one… but you know who I gave it to? The Muslim lads in Rockdale, Brothers Kebabs, and I glaze the f**k out of them. Where’s the reactions to any of that?
“Instead of being thankful for all of those Muslim stores that I had line ups of my followers. how many Muslim stores have youse had line ups at? When you sit around in your car yelling at your phone about how you used to be someone, calling it content. How many Muslim stores have you helped? I’ve done that.”
He claimed that when he opened his kebab store, Muslim influencers tried to “trash the f**k out of it” by leaving bad reviews.
‘Islamophobic’ claims
In the video, he shot back at Muslim influencers, claiming they are weaponising religion to cancel him after other personal attacks failed to stick.
“All the bulls**t yarns of ‘Spanian’s a dog, he’s a snitch’ — that didn’t work,” he said.
“He’s a coward’ — it doesn’t work. I know what youse are doing now. Youse are trying to make every single thing Islamophobic.
“I make a video about how I’m too good looking to have a beard a joke video. Youse turn it into, ‘That’s Islamophobic.’ I don’t know if you know that Christians had beards 700 years before you… But no, ‘I’m too good looking to have a beard’ is Islamophobic.”
Spanian is famous for travelling the world and walking through some of the roughest places on Earth.
He said one of his recent videos has brought the whole saga up again — his trip to Central Asia to cover the treatment of Uyghur Muslims — a minority that is heavily persecuted.
“I travelled to f**king Kazakhstan to do this video,” he said. “Did you watch the actual f**king video? And all yous can do is nitpick… Put hashtag Free Palestine in your f**king bio, or talk about it once every three months, big freedom fighters, and you criticise every f**king thing. I flew over there for that.”
He said the backlash was all about jealousy.
“Youse can talk about me all youse want. I promise you one thing: youse are not going to get anywhere by being social commentators, criticising, trying to bring people down,” he said. “It’s just rubbish, cuz.
“Take it from somebody who was a junkie in jail. Youse are all living in my footsteps, trying to achieve what I achieved. That’s why youse hate me so much. But just take it from me. If you want to make it, you need to actually make good content. Stop talking about people. Stop trying to bring people down.”
Muslim influencers hit back
The video appears to have struck a chord with former bikie enforcer turned Muslim influencer Fred Nagi, who issued a personal response to Spanian on his Instagram page.
In the video he told Spanian he wasn’t always a critic, pointing out that he previously defended the rival creator’s kebab business when others tried to review-bomb it.
“Brother, if you remember correctly, I was the first one to stick up for you and defend you, not for any reason, but because people were lying against your food,” he said.
“I actually went to your shop multiple times and you know what? I still go… whoever had a go at you, it wasn’t me, you know that?”
He said the outrage over the doughnut video stems from Islamic cultural values regarding food wastage, especially given current global conflicts.
“Whoever was having a dig, it’s because in Islam, food is sacred,” he said. “It’s about throwing the food, the way you threw the food, like disrespect, like bang. When people are in Palestine starving all around the world, got nothing to eat. That’s number one.”
He hit back at Spanian’s defence that he simply hates doughnuts and wasn’t targeting the specific Muslim-owned business.
“You say, ‘it’s nothing against this store. I just hate doughnuts. I’m sick of doughnuts.’ Brother, then why did you go to a doughnut shop to eat a doughnut?” he said. “If you’re sick of doughnuts and you’re over doughnuts, why did you go there? Why?
“It’s so easy to say, ‘I’ve got nothing against this doughnut store.’ You do have something against that doughnut store. That’s why you went and shunned it like that, brother. Throwing food, smashing food, launching food, stepping on it, chucking it, pulling, spitting at it. That’s not a good characteristic.”
He claimed Spanian was facing criticism because of his older “hood logic” videos where he gave advice on how to commit violent street crimes.
“You gotta remember, you gotta remember Spaniard, people have been hating on you because the videos you used to make, oh, ‘if you want to rob someone, hide in a bush, when you’re walking past, come out with a brick, whack him in the back of the head. Oh, climb up here, stab this bloke, jump off the balcony’.” he said. “That’s why… Positivity, speak positive, it’s all G. But when you’re saying stuff like that, that’s why, that’s why people have a dig at you.”
He also hit out at Spanian for claims he made about making Muslim inmates cry in prison.
Spanian spent several years behind bars before turning 30. His incarcerations were the result of numerous offences.
“And when you want to say you had Muslim blokes for two hours in their cells crying, brother, you can’t make no Muslim cry,” he said. “You can’t make no one cry in jail. Brother, you were just a puppet in there. You were just doing — that’s why you hate the Muslims, eh?You’re still f**king in pain over it. Get over it.”
Former bikie boss Moudi Tajjour, who left the Nomads Motorcycle Club in 2018 after a four-year jail sentence for manslaughter, also took issue with Spanian’s resurfaced doughnut review.
In a series of Instagram stories he repeatedly challenged the YouTuber to meet up with him before sharing footage of Spanian enjoying a Krispy Kreme doughnut.
“The truth of the f***ing fact is, youse know in your hearts, what’s gonna happen,” he told his followers.
“Underneath this face, youse know, a lot of you f***s wouldn’t dare meet up. Beneath this social media facade, a lot of you real n****s know what I’m like.”
Tajjour took to social media on Thursday morning to claim he had been raided by police after his rant online, writing: “I guess they didn’t like my posts”.
Fellow creator John Lavulo, also known as Big Kash, backed Spanian against the backlash saying he would “always have his back”.
The former bikie and gangster rapper said the “people who have nothing going on” were “really embarrassing”.
“These c**ts have been picking on him for a long time, saying stuff that isn’t true,” he said. “The people that have nothing going on just sit there and observe, brother. Maybe you should get something to do.”
Doughnut store owner’s reaction
L.A Donut owner and Muslim comedian Ms Deguise did not want to comment on the latest videos, but she has addressed the controversy before.
She spoke in a candid 2024 YouTube interview, saying she was going to post a video about it at the time but held back.
She said the weekend after the video came out, the shop was packed.
“I reckon people just watch him and know he’s full of s**t and just go ‘mate he said that place is s**t let’s go there and try it,” she said.
“I think he actually did me a favour because I’ll never ever forget that weekend it was one of my busiest weekends ever.”