ABOVE: Watch the video for “Hello Kitty” by Avril Lavigne
This post has been updated.
TORONTO — Avril Lavigne‘s video for “Hello Kitty” has been officially pulled from YouTube after being savaged online.
The video remains on the Canadian singer’s website (as of Wednesday afternoon) and there is at least one copy of it posted on YouTube.
There has been no comment from Lavigne or her reps.
Criticism of the video started within hours of its debut Monday.
“I adore you avril,” someone tweeted, “but that hello kitty song…”
Rebecca Pahle asked: “How long can you make yourself watch Avril Lavigne’s Hello Kitty music video? I made it to 43 seconds.”
Crispity Crunchity tweeted: “I watched five seconds of that hello kitty video and turned it off as fast if I had been caught watching porn.”
“I’m not quite sure how to process it,” tweeted Patrick Smith.
Hannah Sheridan was more definitive. “I feel physically sick,” she wrote. “Its (sic) so much worse than you could imagine.”
The song, co-written with husband and Nickelback singer Chad Kroeger — as well as David Hodges and Martin Johnson — is featured on Lavigne’s self-titled 2013 album.
It is ostensibly about Lavigne’s real-life obsession with the wildly popular fictional character from Japan, but has a less-innocent double meaning.
“Obviously it’s flirtatious and somewhat sexual, but it’s genuinely about my love for Hello Kitty as well,” Lavigne told Digital Spy last October.
The video for the song was filmed in Japan, where Lavigne is enormously popular. The song starts with Lavigne thanking her fans, in Japanese, and calling them cute.
Here is a look at what some people have to say about the video on Twitter:
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