Poker Pro Justin Bonomo Calls Fellow Pro and Self-Tanning Pitchman Doug Polk a 'F***ing Monster'

CEO/Founder of Thrive UK and poker pro Charlie Carrel recently revealed that he had suffered abuse at the hands of an uncle as a youth.

"I was abused by an Uncle whom by the time I had acknowledged and begin healing as an adult had been dead. I had found myself at his gravesite where he is buried with my grandfather. I was so consumed with hate and rage. My grandfather grave plaque acknowledged his service in WW2."

Let's go back to the video tape, as the great sportscaster Warner Wolf used to say.  In this case, it's a live poker stream.  Note there is some back history here, which we will explore below.

Got some of it for anyone who missed https://t.co/VsqKi6u9MZ

— Melissa Schubert (@poodawgmelissa) May 1, 2023

In a nutshell, Carrel revealed that he was the victim of sexual assault as a child during a live streaming event Polk was participating in.  Carrel further revealed that Polk's treatment of him caused him and his wife severe mental anguish and reputational harm.

Polk came across as dismissive and lacking any form of empathy during the conversation. Not surprisingly, Polk received a significant backlash after the recording of the Twitter Space was shared.

On Monday, Polk issued a rare apology to Carrel.

"I did not take a moment to realize he had gone through something so terrible," Polk said.  "Rather than address that I just focused in on those elements without really having an understanding or a want and a desire to really understand where he was coming from.  And for that I am sorry."

I want to apologize to @Charlie_Carrel pic.twitter.com/WIzcB1i53O

— Doug Polk (@DougPolkVids) May 1, 2023

Polk also said he would be taking down any videos addressing this matter on his platform.

Carrel has been tweeting about the incident on his own Twitter account over the past few days with support coming from others within the poker community, including Justin Bonomo, who referred to Polk as "a monster".

.@Charlie_Carrel Jesus Christ, I just listened to a recording of that Twitter space and I just want to say I’m so immensely sorry that you had to go through that

Doug is a fucking monster
 

— Bonologic (@JustinBonomo) May 1, 2023

Bonomo continued:

"So many moments where my heart broke for you, but it especially struck a chord with me when you talked about all the people reaching out to support you privately while being to afraid to support you publicly So here I am publicly Doug is a monster for what he did to you.

"I know I’m going to be called a virtue signaler for this Bring it on. I am intentionally “signaling” that we should all stand up for victims of abuse when they are viciously attacked and slandered like this."

Bonomo also explained that much of this dates back to 2019.

"In a 2019 Tweet, Charlie used the word 'empathy' when talking about how to prevent pedophilia Doug made a YouTube video saying Charlie was pro-pedophila. It got 750k views."

Content warning: sexual abusehttps://t.co/5bAcaHgKvO

Start at 16:40

Context before that: Doug is telling Berkey to join him in creating a podcast where people disagree and debate each other

— Bonologic (@JustinBonomo) May 1, 2023

Not everyone seemed empathetic towards Carrel. Ryan Fee evoked "wokeness" in his Twitter response regarding the situation:

"Yeah, no. Charlie tweeted something vague enough so people could misconstrue it as support for pedophiles so he could jump in and LIE and say “no it wasn’t, I was saying have empathy”. You’re a sucker, you hear the word victim and you take the bait just like all the wokes."

As fun as it would be to take the easy ratio, making a joke about Doug's schlong in your mouth, I recognise you're your own person, and you have your own perspectives.

How about we hash out in a @dankness3 Twitter space, and behave like adults? https://t.co/4gC3175IY0

— Charlie Carrel (@Charlie_Carrel) May 1, 2023

Joshua Harris tweeted to Fee in reference to the Polk-Carrel drama:

"Its not surprising those 2 clowns found each other."

Another wrote:

"Charlie had his wokeness backfire on him. And it’s been like what 3 plus years to finally get this public conversation. How convenient it is that the “woke” movement has gone to the extent of becoming blind. Now he has support of countless blind ppl that want to go at his defense."

In addition to poker and podcasting, Polk is also a self-tanner entrepreneur, whose organic product that doesn't turn you orange is pretty well sought out here at Gambling911.com of all places.

- Nagesh Rath, Gambling911.com