Posted in: Games, Video Games | Tagged: entertainment, games, prosyndicate, video games, youtube

YouTube Is Currently Awash With High School Drama Played Out On A Serious And Scary Scale

YouTube as an idea has changed the game, certainly in our field as a pop culture website, but also in just about every industry with an online presence. It's a ludicrously powerful tool with a huge influence across the entire world, and viewerships that dwarf those of most television shows. Many see it as the birth of the new guard, and in the press field, many see it as the usurper to online website in the same way online once was to print.

However, as YouTube has grown and grown, especially in the last few years, it is having some serious teething problems. Largely, this comes from the audience's fascination with "drama". Essentially, a focus on in-fighting, corruption and unsavoury nature of some of the platform's biggest stars. Of course, this doesn't apply for the vast, vast, VAST majority of users that make brilliant content that I engage with daily. There are so many beautiful channels promoting great lifestyles, having a good time, and just being out and out good people.

However, I'm here to talk about the countless channels, many of which have very young viewers who thrive on toxicity, vulgarity and/or unethical behaviour. Just recently, two big YouTubers have been accused of setting up a gambling site with a loop hole, not coming forward as the owners of the site and indirectly encouraging under-aged kids to buy into it. On top of that. Keemstar has allegedly encouraged his audience to swat smile4youtubegaming* and his family in a truly vindictive livestream. Both of these incidents are just two drops in the ocean of awfulness going around at the moment on the website, with allegations of rape and abuse against several high profile users being an issue over the last few years, and rather unsavoury pranks really pushing the bounds of common decency making big news. In fact, there are currently members of the channel Trollstation serving prison time for faking an art gallery heist.

It's getting ugly out there, and it is all playing out in the tone of high school drama. It's petty showboating with the added spice of escalation. It's he-said-she-said nonsense played out on a stage of millions, many of users whom this kind of back and forth will be familiar to the hallways of their school time. The kind of arguments that seem like the most important thing when they happen, but through the prism of age and maturity, are trite. It's easy to think in these terms that all of this is inconsequential, as those arguments prove to be.

"This is just kids, being kids."

However, that is so far from the truth. YouTube created a platform that empowered a bunch of young people with money and influence before they could possibly know who they are as people, or given any guidance on how to deal with such a rise in social status. Because of that, some of the big personalities on the platform don't seem equipped to handle the power and it's lead to childish drama and fallouts, that viewers are only ever rewarding. It's reality TV played out on insane proportions and with no control of a network TV station. In some cases, it can seem like the asylum is run by the inmates.

I've used the term "high school drama" to paint a picture here; a tone. The truth is though, what is happening to the most toxic of online celebrities is important. The "they are just kids having petty arguments" line is not true. Kids, literal children, watch and learn from these people as YouTube is so easily accessible and hard to monitor for most parents. On top of that, so many of the personalities engaging in this awful behaviour are actually well over the legal age. TmarTn and Syndicate are 23, Keemstar, who's swatting incident just recently is merely a footnote on a list of awful things he has done, is 33 and a parent. All of these people engaging in this "high school drama" are well over the age of 21. There absolutely should be accountability on all of these accounts, but the blasé way we, Youtube and even law enforcement sometimes treat allegedly illegal activity online is obviously not enough. It's kids, who are not kids, running wild like it's the first time they have been away from their parents. Toxicity breeds toxicity, and it's a crying shame to see the YouTube platform descend into chaos because of it.

As I said earlier, I adore the platform and use it daily. There are so many great YouTubers who do promote positivity and have actively spoken out against stuff like this. People like Pewdiepie, Boogie2988, GameGrumps and Markiplier, who have larger followings than most of these 'others' are doing good work. Jim Sterling and Kinda Funny have created a fascinating model coming out of traditional online games press. Phillip DeFranco seems like a nice guy with a good head on his shoulders. There are so many popular YouTubers who are rising above it all.

Still, this doesn't mean we should turn a blind eye to some of the goings on on the website. This could be YouTube's difficult teen phase, but lest us forget that the issues that we are seeing pop up aren't entertainment. They are perpetrating awful content to millions who buy into negativity and use their numbers to have a very real consequence on people's lives. That isn't, and shouldn't be the face of the website.

* I'm going to be fair to Keemstar here and post this video in which he explains his long standing behaviour. The video that I linked about swatting another person did come after this revelation though. 

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