Liver King is a body builder, business owner, and influencer who promotes nutritional advice and healthy lifestyle choices summarized by his nine “Ancestral Tenants”. Liver King is best known for his out of the ordinary diet consisting mostly of raw organs and meat. His followers, known as “Primals” follow his exercise and nutrition advice on various platforms such as YouTube, Instagram, Tik-Tok and more. Liver King is a unique and popular social media star, but he is not without controversy. 

Although some of the Liver King’s teachings are unanimously agreed to be sound, such as the benefits of exercise and the value of family connection, many have argued that his promotion of nutritional choices consisting primarily of raw organs and meat is irrational and not backed up by any science to prove that this diet is especially beneficial in any way. Also, Liver King’s unusually impressive muscular build has caused major social media figures such as Joe Rogan to accuse Liver King of steroid use. Amid Liver King’s rise to fame and the world’s suspicion of Liver King’s steroid use, he repeatedly denied these accusations and provided questionable evasive responses when asked about the matter. 

 A popular internet and bodybuilding skeptic, Derek of the YouTube channel “More Plates More Dates” posted a video titled the “Liver King Lie” on November 28th, 2022, presenting and analyzing leaked evidence of Liver King’s steroid consumption including an email originally intended for a coach specifically detailing his usage. After this information was leaked, Liver King addressed, admitted, and apologized for his lies about the usage in a video titled “Liver King Confession… I Lied.” and posted via his Liver King YouTube channel.  

 People opposing Liver King criticized his use of steroids because people believed that he was using his unnatural yet impressive physique to advertise his supplements for personal monetary gain. Also, people believed he used his looks to push an unrealistic narrative that following his diet and lifestyle would make one appear as muscular as Liver King. 

Seattle Prep Health and Wellness teacher and head of the Boys’ Soccer Program David Smith provided some insight into the controversy surrounding Liver King. Smith presented the idea that “Any time anyone comes with an extreme dietary program you must be a little skeptical. Obviously, liver is a wonderful nutritious food, . . . but whenever someone comes with a claim when there are monetary gains to be made from popularity or sales or notoriety you always must be skeptical.” Smith added that this applies to the incentive of Liver King lying about steroid use because monetary gain and notoriety can be a strong potential incentive.  

Smith also shared his perspective that, “there’s no way someone can be that (muscularly) big without potential supplements . . . and looking at how big he was you would always suspect there was some performance enhancement” 

In his apology video Liver King said, “Liver King the public figure was an experiment to spread the message, to bring awareness (…) Our people are hurting at record rates with depression, autoimmune (diseases), anxiety, infertility, (and) low ambition in life”.  

An occasional viewer of Liver King’s content and Sophomore at Prep Charlie Fisk’ 25 provided some commentary on the matter saying, “I appreciate how Liver King promotes weight training, exercise, and living a healthy and active life. (…) Even though Liver King did lie about using steroids which I think is wrong, I appreciate that Liver King is trying to help people live healthier lives, especially because we live in a time where this is rare”.  

Another Prep sophomore Truman Neuburger ’25 shares some of his appreciation for Liver King’s content “Liver King’s daily snapchat videos brighten my day; I chose to disregard his dishonesty and steroid use because I believe he is trying to convey a good message.” 

Liver King now claims to be “natty”, a term for natural body builders not using any performance enhancing drugs. Liver King now posts videos and photos documenting how he maintains his looks even while being off of steroids as well as posting old videos of him before the fame attempting to prove he has always been quite strong and muscular. Smith presented the idea that Liver King may be cycling steroids saying, “Many people cycle performance enhancing drugs and although he’s saying he off them now doesn’t mean he won’t go back”.  

Smith also added, “I would be skeptical whether or not that (he is off of steroids) is truthful . . . but I believe everyone deserves a second chance.”  

Surprisingly, Liver King now seems to be even more famous than before all the controversy and retains a large following so it can be expected Liver King will continue using social media to show off his usual antics lifting, shouting, and most importantly eating liver.