I watch a handful of commentary YouTube channels. It’s my way of keeping up with the "gossip." Though really, it is news. Everyday news, as it were. Like, we don’t have newspaper articles anymore sharing everyday life stories, so that void has to be filled somehow, and that how is commentary videos. It’s simply the way it is.
If you don’t have any connection or awareness of the everyday pop culture going on around you, then you will lose touch with the current generations.
I don’t feel old because I can still understand what "the yoots" are talking about.
Do I like a lot of the stuff that’s going on? No. But at least I’m not going to be blindsided by the surprise of it all.
Like, the current big thing is teenaged "tradwives" and "SAHGFs" trying to push their lifestyle onto younger girls. There’s like 600 of them out there being like "I’m 19 years old with 2 kids and I’m a stay at home wife/girlfriend. My man is 35. He’s great." And I want to be like "Was he your youth pastor?"
And I have to wonder, if they’re really tradwives, why are they on the Internet? They should be in the kitchen alone cooking. They should be barefoot and pregnant with no money of their own. I mean, that’s the lifestyle they’re trying to talk other non-social media content creators into.
I read that book "Yesteryear," and while I didn’t really enjoy it (it wasn’t for me), I totally got the point that it was making: She presented a faux lifestyle ala Ballerina Farms "Everything is made from scratch using my own two hands and muscles" when really she had a full staff of workers in the background doing all the heavy lifting. And she was very smugly annoyed at "the feminists" complaining about her downhome lifestyle, when really they were complaining that everything she presented as being real was simply manufactured content produced by a millionaire/billionaire and the subsequent money a rich person has to cosplay that lifestyle.
And that’s what a lot of the content today is: Manufactured lifestyle content.
You don’t really live like that. You’re renting a set for a few days to film your content. You are using your children as props to either sell products or to be the products that you’re selling to the public. For money, you are presenting a lifestyle you would not choose to live yourself. You are the face of late stage capitalism.
I am glad that people are going "Ugh" about modern influencers. They are not influencing anything, they are simply repackaged QVC hosts selling stuff from their personal channels and peddling their presumed clout in hopes of getting free stuff and money from rich brands. They are insincere, and I’m relieved that people are beginning to turn away from them and their nonsense.
When it reaches the point that an "influencer" walks into a regular grocery store and acts like she’s found herself on an alien planet… They are out of touch, so why are you letting them choose how you live your life? They have no clue what your life is like, so why would you trust them to choose how your lifestyle should be? "Out of touch weirdo" as the new aesthetic? Why?
And I do blame social media companies for giving these people platforms. Why is their content being pushed by the algorithm? Why are they allowed to monetize their clearly harmful content?
I still remember years ago that story of the 9-year old girl using a straw to drink a whole glass of boiling water because she watched a monetized video that gave her the idea. Adults created content they clearly aimed at children, and the content they produced was dangerous.
There’s those squishy ball toys now that have been very popular recently, and warnings had to be given to not put them in the microwave "to soften them up" because the heat would cause the toy to burst and basically lavalike gel could get all over a person and burn them to death. Why? Because idiots on social media were putting them in the microwave and telling people it’s an easy way to make them squishier.
I don’t believe the Internet should be made safe for children. That’s an impossible thing to do. Unless a website or a blog or a video channel says theirs is child safe content, then it is intended for somewhat mature audiences. People with enough commonsense to know not to put a gel-filled toy in the microwave.
You can’t force people to child safe THE ENTIRE INTERNET because children should not be running around free on the Internet. There should be adult supervision in their lives. And if their parents and guardians would rather force strangers to completely go out of their way to protect children, then those parents and guardians should not have those children.
Like, why are you giving your child free run of the Internet? Why aren’t you supervising their Internet usage and asking questions about their lives and what they’re doing all the time on their phones, tablets, and PCs? Why are you letting them wear headphones so you can’t hear what other people are saying in the game chats and then letting them play with adults you don’t know?
Or why are you creating social media channels where you use your children for monetized content when they are too young to give their consent? Because sure, a child is going to say "Yeah, I’m okay with you putting my image on the Internet especially if it means you’re going to buy me the toys, furniture, food I want" and they’re not going to understand what that means. They have no concept of pedophiles and weirdos and child abductions. All they want is to make their parents happy, so they’re going to say Yes even if they don’t understand what is happening.
I don’t believe children should be on social media. I don’t believe that family channels or channels starring children should be monetized.
Just like I don’t think adults should be allowed to interact with children on Roblox.
For reals: If you create a place for children, pedophiles are going to go there, and it is up to the platform to put security in place that prevents pedophiles from interacting with children.
And I understand that we have reached a point where technology allows adults to make fake voices that sound like children, and that they’re going to use those voices to interact with children. Sickos are gonna sicko, it is what it is.
But there should not be content purposefully aimed at children as the audience without it going through some kind of checks. And I get that creators are bypassing parents by creating content that looks kid-friendly–bright colors, quirky outfits, a loud overacted style–on first glance, which they later excuse by saying "My content was never intended for a child audience."
My dude, you clearly targeted children with your content. Your entire thing is to make non-attentive parents think that you are child-safe content.
That little girl that drank boiling water and died got the idea from a channel that appeared to serve child friendly content. It was dangerous stuff wrapped up in wrapping paper intended for children.
It’s the same way Colleen Ballinger wrapped her content up in such a way that parents were taking their children to her shows. Because she made YouTube videos where she dressed in a child friendly way, put out a character that seemed childlike and thus "for children," and inattentive parents didn’t even take the time to realize that she was a weirdo. On the Internet.
It wasn’t until she sent lingerie to A CHILD that people started going "Hey! I don’t think this lady’s content is intended for children. I think she should be on a watch list because she might actually be a child predator!" (Allegedly.)
So even if government agencies tried to make the Internet as a whole "child safe," it would never work. Because predators are going to predator.
They are out there, 24/7 working on ways to bypass supervision so as to get to their targets. And their targets are children.
The only ones being adversely affected by the laws are going to be normal people living normal lives minding their own business. Why? Because having to send a "live" selfie and a copy of your government issued ID to sketchy social media websites is inherently unsafe.
Harper Kingsley
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You can’t operate under the assumption that EVERY PERSON has to sacrifice their safety and their freedom to keep children safe on the Internet. It is the job of the parents and guardians to protect their children.
And of course rebellious kids are going to sneak onto the Internet. It’s the same way rebellious kids are going to sneak out of the house, or smoke weed, or drink alcohol, or do a million other things they’re not supposed to do.
But I’m not the parent of those kids. I should not be FORCED to be responsible for their safety when their parents are right there.
Why are you giving a toddler a tablet with a direct connection to the Internet? Why aren’t you monitoring what they’re doing? Why are they able to click on links or enter video chats with strangers?
Do I think it’s the Internet’s fault that Clavicular entered incel forums and grew up to be a weirdo? No. I blame his parents.
They didn’t realize anything was wrong with him until he was smashing his face with a hammer.
He was able to purchase black market steroids, testosterone, peptides WHILE HE WAS A MINOR.
Like, there are parents out there that are like "My kid is so defiant and OUT OF CONTROL that he watches anime!" and they’re able to send their kid to a 6-week rehab camp that turns out to be a torture farm.
That dude’s parents are rich. They had enough money for him to make expensive purchases off the black market. They could have afforded a nanny. They could have sent him to a live-in private school where he wouldn’t have been able to leave campus to access a PO Box. There were so many options available to them as a wealthy family. They just simply didn’t care to try.
And that’s not my fault.
I’m not responsible for children on the Internet because children should not be on the Internet unsupervised. They should not be clicking random links or hanging out on forums with adults. They should not be forcing themselves into adult spaces to the point that the government is like "We have to close down all these adult spaces because children are there."
Nobody wants children there. Other than the children themselves and the pedophiles that prey upon them.
Just like I cringe away from the 50 and 60 year olds going onto the child dancing app to publicly share their sexual content.
"Why are you doing that? It’s disgusting. You are in public!"
And some of them like to pretend that just like children they don’t understand how the Internet works. "What do you mean people can screencap the things I’m putting out and share it other places? What do you mean they can screen record my sex vids and reupload it other places? How is it technologically possible for my image to be fed into an AI generator to create disgusting content I myself wouldn’t choose to share?!?"
I just want to be like "You aren’t fooling anyone. You are 50 years old. You grew up with the Internet. You were using CDs from AOL to go on the Internet and sext with strangers on BBS forums. You used Netscape. You are not a child. Stop it."
If you’re an adult and you go onto social media, you should have enough awareness to realize that you are in a public venue. Children are innocent and they can’t really conceptualize that there are BILLIONS of people out there and that some of them are dangerous and unpleasant. But an adult?
You can choose not to go onto social media platforms.
You can choose not to target your content toward children.
And you should have the freedom to not worry that children are wandering unsupervised on social media. They are not supposed to be there if they’re under 13 years old.
So I can see those 19 year old tradwives/SAHMs/SAHGFs and their propagandist content and I can tsk and shake my head and feel disgust at them and wonder how many of them are going to regret the lifestyle choices they bought into at such a young age. Then I can move on to other content that I prefer to see. And it’s easy for me, because I’m not their target audience.
They are preying on children. Because they are child predators. The tools of the patriarchy and religious cults that like to scream about the depletion of the domestic supply of (white) infants.
I don’t know for sure that they’re paid influencers given a mission to recruit young girls into a submissive lifestyle. But I do know that there are a lot of weirdos out there screaming pretty loudly about how bad it is that teen pregnancies are on the decline. And now all of a sudden there’s a massive amount of "tradlifestyle" influencers pushing the idea that teenagers should marry adults and start popping out babies before their bodies have fully developed.
And I’ve noticed, with all the pregnancy advocates out there, there’s very little public information about how damaging pregnancy is to the body.
I’ve known people that have lost their teeth because of pregnancy and calcium leeching. I’ve known people that have had lifetime bladder issues because of pregnancy. I’ve known people that had to get a vaginal mesh inserted because their parts were permanently loosened due to pregnancy and it got to the point where the parts were literally falling out.
Pregnancy is dangerous. Birthing a baby can be deadly. And even if you have a good birth and survive, there’s a big chance you’re going to be dealing with a lifetime of bodily harm.
Pregnancy is not a joke.
So those influencers trying to get children to buy into a lifestyle that involves multiple births before they’re 20 years old?
Monsters. Demons in human form. Every single one.
~Harper Kingsley
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