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‘There were moments I felt used, rushed, shaped into something I didn’t fully choose’
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Published Dec 25, 2025 • Last updated 11 hours ago • 4 minute read
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Justin Bieber attends The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute benefit gala on Sept. 13, 2021, in New York. Photo by Evan Agostini /InvisionArticle content
Justin Bieber is getting introspective during the holiday season.
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As he got ready to celebrate Christmas with his wife Hailey and his 16-month-old son Jack Blues, the 31-year-old Canadian-born pop star reflected on his Christian faith and his troubled early years in the music industry.
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“Christmas time is that time to reflect and ask yourself what you really want. What truly fulfills?” he began in a post on Instagram.
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Christmas, Bieber continued, “is a reminder of Jesus and the free gift of forgiveness only he can offer.”
Bieber called his personal growth “a journey” and admitted that “letting go (of) resentment is hard,” but he encouraged his followers to be open to the teachings of Christ.
“When Jesus reveals (himself) as willing and able, it’s hard to deny him,” he wrote. “Hope wherever you are you can lean into this love that meets us exactly where we are no matter what.”
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Bieber continued his post in a carousel of notes he called, “A Message.” In the ensuing pages, the two-time Grammy winner painfully wrote that he “grew (up) in a system that rewarded my gift but didn’t always protect my soul.”
“There were moments I felt used, rushed, shaped into something I didn’t fully choose. This kind of pressure leaves wounds you don’t see on stage,” the Baby singer added.
After becoming a music star at the age of 15 when he released his first EP My World in 2009, Bieber said he became part of “a system that took more than it protected.”
But Bieber went on to write that he is now “healed” and has embraced forgiveness. “I don’t want to burn the music industry down,” he said. “I want to see it made new – safer, more honest, more human.”
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Bieber wrote that he “didn’t come out of this untouched” and said he came of age “inside a system that took more than it guarded.” But he told his followers he’s no longer a “victim still bleeding” and added that he was addressing them “as someone restored.”
In separate posts, Bieber gave a glimpse into his holiday preparations, sharing smiling images of himself, a cozy fireplace with three stockings and photos of Jack Blues wearing a red Santa hat.
Singer’s troubled past resurfaced following Diddy arrest
Bieber’s childhood rise in the music industry came under scrutiny after the arrest of Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs, who was accused of sex trafficking and convicted of prostitution-related charges earlier this year.
A 2020 video resurfaced in which Bieber vowed to “protect” Billie Eilish from the music industry as he tearfully talked about his experience becoming an overnight sensation when he was just a teenager.
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“I just want to protect her,” he said, speaking of Eilish, who was 18 at the time. “I don’t want her to go through anything I went through. I don’t wish that upon anybody.”
He told Apple Music’s Zane Lowe that some parts of his younger life were “bad … it was dark.”
A video that was shared to Bieber’s YouTube page in 2009 also went viral again as it showed the SWAG II artist planning to spend a wild couple of days with Diddy.
“You ever seen the movie 48 Hrs? Right now (Justin is) having 48 hours with Diddy, him and his boy,” Combs says, as a wide-eyed Bieber looks on.
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During a joint appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live! in 2011, when Bieber was still a minor, Combs said the pair had “become friends in a strange way.”
But their banter took a turn when Combs tried to shut down probing questions about their friendship. “He knows better than to be talking about the things that he does with big brother Puff on national television,” Combs said. “Everything ain’t for everybody.”
Other videos that racked up millions of views on social media included one showing the two meeting in 2021 and Combs patting Bieber on the back and chest in what some believed was an attempt to see if he was wearing a wire.
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Another clip that was viewed more than 4.1 million times on X showed an inebriated Bieber drinking alongside Combs at a party.
Famous singer Jaguar Wright just revealed in an interview that she heard Justin Bieber is a victim in one of the Diddy tapes currently being shopped around.
Here is footage of Justin being forced by Diddy to drink more at a freak off, despite already being well passed… pic.twitter.com/Zwz850DgPA
— Matt Wallace (@MattWallace888) October 9, 2024
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Bieber has been open about his drug and alcohol use when he was a minor, saying in the 2020 documentary, Justin Bieber: Seasons, “My security would come into my room at night to check my pulse. People don’t know how serious it got. It was legit crazy scary.”
But he has never addressed in detail the other ways his private life was affected by people he interacted with in the music industry.
Following Combs’ arrest, some of Bieber’s fans wondered if he would speak out about his time as a part of the Bad Boys Records founder‘s inner circle.
But a rep for the One Time hitmaker said that he wasn’t one of Diddy’s alleged victims.
“Although Justin is not among Sean Combs’ victims, there are individuals who were genuinely harmed by him,” Bieber’s rep said in the statement shared with various media outlets this past May. “Shifting focus away from this reality detracts from the justice these victims rightfully deserve.”
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