Logan Paul, racist @$$hole!

With all the uproar over sexual assault in the entertainment industry over the past several months, it’s only natural to take a hard look at racist behavior by people who call themselves entertainers as well, including YouTube “vloggers”. ALL forms of bigotry need to be addressed, because all of them are based on one thing: a desire to disrespect others you see as inferior to yourself.

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http://metro.co.uk/2018/01/09/logan-paul-exactly-vloggers-falling-love-youtube-7216313/

Logan Paul is exactly why vloggers are falling out of love with YouTube

opinion
Lucy Wood Tuesday 9 Jan 2018 4:26 pm

No one likes change, but I can pretty much promise you that no one hates it more right now than YouTubers.

If you follow any vloggers on social media, then you’ve probably seen at least a couple of them expressing everything from confusion, to disappointment to just plain rage towards the video platform recently. Feel free to eye roll, sigh a big sigh and mutter that they’ve never worked a day in their life so probably need to shut up (‘cos you’re mostly right, there).

But I, a humble YouTuber who tends to steer clear from dead bodies hanging in renowned suicide forests, am here to explain exactly why YouTube has become maybe the most frustrating place to create stuff right now.

The direction that YouTube has taken over the past few years is something that none of us were really expecting when we first fell in love with it, but should have been less naïve towards.

Alarm bells should probably have started faintly ringing in the distance around the time that Zoella found herself standing as a global brand, rather than just a girl sitting in her bedroom talking about cool bath bombs and Primark slippers. YouTube became a money making machine in a relatively short space of time, and things just aren’t the same anymore.

As someone who regularly uploads to a modest-sized audience, it’s almost painful to admit – but there’s no way that viewers can possibly connect in the same way with YouTubers now as they did then. Not now that there’s so much profit, gain and awareness of public image involved in the process.

The reason we all loved the old school faves (I’m talking Jenna Marbles, Kingsley, Mamrie Hart, Tyler Oakley…) so much was because they were like our own normal, hilarious, slightly weird friends who made us feel less alone. They genuinely had no idea that they were on the brink of something lucrative or even profitable.

Nowadays, it couldn’t be more different. At any given moment, there’s a 16 year old girl signing up to make a YouTube account, solely with the career aspiration of becoming a YouTuber. In 2016, a careers website found that a moderately terrifying 70% of 15-25 year olds chose ‘YouTube star’ as their dream job. It’s enough to make you be a bit sick in your mouth really, isn’t it?

Sweetness and light personified, 2018 Man Of The Year, would take home to your parents, all round good egg Logan Paul has recently become the embodiment of this community-wide feeling of apathy to what used to be a much-loved, passionate platform.

Because really, and I’m just going to say it how it is, what is the point in making good, meaningful, creative, understated content, when the number one promoted, trending video spot on the whole site goes to a guy who wore an fluffy alien hat to Aokigahara and filmed the body of a man who felt desolate and hopeless enough to end his own life. Give it a thumbs up. Share with your mates. Buy the merch. Link in bio. I mean HONESTLY, shall we all just cut off the wifi connection right now and call it a day? What is the point?

There’s no question that YouTube as a platform has got a lot to answer for freely promoting that one (something that they haven’t yet answered with any satisfying response, btw), but YouTube as a business also needs to step back and take a look at how it’s approaching its own industry now. YouTube has created its own monster. It’s breeding this type of creator, who feels so disassociated with sentiment and real life, that filming a hanging body seems okay because it’s all in the name of views. It’s all about clickbait, it’s all about who can shout the loudest, and it’s all about shock factor. That’s the formula that leads to the trending page, the money, the subscribers, the fame and the success.

Anything necessary to hit the numbers is done without hesitation by those who can stomach it, because it seemingly pays off. Five years on and viewers rightly expect more in terms of production quality, but also, not so rightly, in terms of shock factor. The sense of community and internet friendship that once was, has been silenced by people shouting about dabbing on them haters. Or whatever it is that they say.