2018 needs to be the year talentless YouTubers like Logan Paul crawl back into their caves
They’ve always been awful
A YouTuber filming a dead body for clicks and laughing about it might sound like an episode of Black Mirror, but it's not. So let me introduce Logan Paul.
He's a 22 year-old YouTuber who posts daily videos on his channel and has 15 million subscribers. And last night, he uploaded a video showing the body of a suicide victim.
To put this in perspective: Logan Paul's average viewer is an impressionable, pre-pubescent child. And without hesitating, he posted a video titled: "We found a dead body in the Japanese Suicide Forest…" with him posing in front of the corpse in the thumbnail.
In the full video (which has now been deleted) he goes close up to the dead man and asks: "Are you alive? Are you fucking with us?" He zooms in to the body, blurring the face out. Logan and his friends laugh as he says: "What, you never stood next to a dead guy?" And shortly after, instead of calling for help, he does what any normal human being would do, he films the entire thing.
But this behaviour is hardly surprising. Paul has built his entire career on doing "crazy" things for clicks. Once he tricked his young fans into thinking he was shot in a hotel before a meet and greet. And you can see the horror on their faces as they watched:
Isn't it about time we stopped YouTubers like him getting away with all the truly awful and unethical things they've done to build their empires?
They capitalise on young, impressionable viewers
Though Logan Paul isn't the only YouTuber guilty of doing this, he regularly plugs his "Maverick" merchandise in his videos. Over Christmas, he even made various tuneless songs, telling his fans to buy it. Whilst simultaneously informing them that he "met Mrs Claus and hit it twice." YouTubers like him exploit children, selling them "inclusion"and "friendship" through expensive merchandise.
They act like entirely self-obsessed teenagers while their fans worship the ground they walk on
The prankster mega-YouTubers have bred a culture of self obsession. When Logan sees the dead body, his first words aren't: "Let's call the police. Instead, they're: "This is a first for me." And every other video follows a similar format. These YouTubers do nothing apart from care about themselves.
They have become untouchable because no matter what they do, their fans will defend them to their deaths. Just watch some of these reaction videos made by his naive fans today and try not to weep for the future of humanity:
They will literally do anything for views
Creating content all the time means you have to keep topping whatever you've done before. But a Youtuber's attention seeking nature, like the guy who cemented his head in a microwave, means they won't stop until they realise just how far they've crossed the line for views.
They harass their friends on camera, carry out dangerous and mind-numbingly pointless stunts, all to get people clicking on their videos.
Their videos are completely devoid of any meaning
These videos don't teach people anything, they're meaningless and the most they show is how to be an obnoxious, loud and disrespectful brat, whilst completely lacking any actual talent (aside from monetising everything, obviously.)
And the worst part? People like Logan Paul present it as an achievement, giving life advice to his fans, whilst robbing them blind at the same time.
This isn't new. We've known YouTubers have been bad for a long time. But finally, people are waking up to the fact that we would be better off without these talentless people on our screens. Please let 2018 be the year they crawl back into their caves and never, ever come out again.
If you are feeling emotionally distressed about suicide or anything else mention in this article, Samaritans is available 24 hours a day for anyone struggling to cope and provide a safe place to talk where calls are completely confidential. The UK phone number is 116 123.