The ME Problem

This isn’t about medical examiners. It’s maddening that I have to address this again, but it’s a big deal and it’s getting worse.

When I wrote about YouTube reactors, I think I was a bit too kind. I even tried “venting” on Reddit, but it was taken down immediately, probably by AI algorithms that caught certain words and didn’t like them.

Here, for now at least, I can talk freely, and while I can, I intend to pull absolutely zero punches.

Because we’re in a serious crisis, and I don’t just mean the United States, I mean the whole fucking world.

First, there’s the “ME” problem, and it’s not just a bad look, it’s a reflection of how many people have sold their souls for next to nothing.

YouTube reactors generally don’t make a fortune, but there are exceptions that I find outrageous. Some can make about a million a year in U.S. dollars, and that’s just for posting videos of them watching movies. If you want to watch it for free, you can pick any video you want to watch from a creator and watch them cry or laugh at clips of movies. Some react to songs for heaven’s sake.

While I found it a novel thing at first, I wasn’t long in finding that the whole concept was infuriating. Why should I enjoy watching someone else watch a movie? It’s a stupid idea. A waste of time. And worse, if you want to suggest a movie, you have to pay.

That’s right: Patreon. That scam that takes money out of your account every month so you can watch someone you don’t even know watch a movie you’ve already seen.

It gets worse; high-tier members can watch the whole movie along with them. But you need your own copy and it has to start when theirs starts. Not only that, but you have your own copy, so what the fuck do you need them for?

Ads give them some revenue, but to make money, they have to post more videos. So they depend on Patreon, but don’t forget, there’s also something else they push: merch.

That’s short for “merchandise,” otherwise known as cheap shit like T-shirts you’re going to pay too much for, and frankly should be embarrassed to be seen in. Then there are “fistable” coffee mugs. That means they’re big enough to stick your fist in. Which reminds me every time I hear it of “fisting,” a sexual act in which one puts their fist into a certain orifice. Eww.

Now that they’ve had you associate merch with sex, you’re going to buy one. Right?

That’s where real money can be made. Buying crates of T-shirts cheap and marking them up is good business. It’s how sales work. Economics 101.

I’m telling you, it’s maddening to think of anyone buying this crap. It’s worse than T-shirt shops on the boardwalk at the Ocean, where french fries cost more than five pounds of potatoes, and you have to stand in line for an hour, wondering if your kids are still where you left them and losing ten pounds sweating your ass off because swimsuits aren’t allowed on the fucking boardwalk. God forbid you get in line with a blonde in a bikini and offend her by stealing too many looks at her cleavage.

Which is ridiculous because you wouldn’t wear a bikini if you didn’t like people looking.

The merch is too costly. They’re going to tell you “it really helps out the channel and allows us to keep making great content for you.”

For you? Ha!

It’s not about you, it’s about your money. It’s about them. And they are all about themselves. It’s the ME ME ME generation. Gimme money. Watch ME watch a fucking movie. Pay for the privilege of watching ME watch a movie.

But the ME part goes deep.

Some channels will censor themselves. Worse, they censor the movies, so you can’t even hear what’s being said. Some dub over the word “fuck” to please YouTube and their audience. They love catering to “Christians,” most of whom object while they themselves use the word at work a thousand times a day.

Wait. I’m supposed to pay you to watch movies that I can only see clips of and are censored too?

Censorship is a problem. To hide is to cover the truth. You see it most in the news, because you know you’re not being told everything that’s happening. It is to tell a lie.

Now, if someone polices their language, I have no problem with it. Sometimes it is better to not say something. But it’s fake. That’s not okay with me. One video has lots of cussing while later, that reactor censors so much that you can’t make out a full sentence in the whole video.

Why watch something like that?

Some things I wish they would censor. Like the woman who has a perpetual sinus drip and wipes her snot everywhere except a facial tissue. She’s in her bed, for Pete’s sake, and I’ll bet anything those comforters are already stiff before she has sex with her husband. It ain’t a fight over who sleeps on the wet spot, it’s who has to sleep on the crispy part.

They love being on camera. Some really should know better. Ink on women can be fine, but it is usually a whole sleeve or a series of weird symbols that crawl from one arm with spaces between them and end up on her breasts, and that’s cleavage I don’t want to see. You mean you paid someone to scribble on you like you’re a doodle pad for some nervous business owner on the phone? Come on.

But the tide of YouTube reactors may be beginning to ebb.

Some have already gone to Only Fans and they reveal everything and even have sex for paying customers to see and beat off to.

That’s a new low. Yes, I know. Sex work can be profitable, and I get it. But how many are doing it out of desperation and how many are being coerced by a spouse or someone else? That’s the low I’m talking about. Sexual exploitation is and always has been a plague. It’s cruel and traumatic and wrong. It happens to people of almost all ages and a larger world population means more forced sex and violence. Bondage videos with women’s breasts being squeezed by bizarre contraptions has to cause deep tissue damage. I’ve seen worse, too. It can’t possibly be done with their consent.

Selfie nudes and bikini photos and see-through attire are everywhere from the biggest porn sites to social media. That’s not for money, it’s the ME thing again. Look at me! ME!

Vanity rules, and dignity doesn’t matter anymore; it’s too rare.

The world economy doesn’t help much, even women who do have some dignity and can feel embarrassed and humiliated are being forced into posting very graphic things for money. Want to feed your kids? Fine, do a masturbation video. Even celebrities do it; roles in Hollywood and in entertainment in general aren’t easy to get, and even A-listers get desperate. They jump in front of the camera nude and most seem happy to do it. They’re full of themselves anyway, look at ME!

Bloggers are the same, as are videos of opinions on politics and lifestyle. Fashion and influencer videos are the worst. Those require more vanity than every other video genre combined, and they cost people money, people who buy makeup and skin care products and hair colorings. Every time I see a video thumbnail I know that isn’t going to be in the video or, if it’s someone’s face, it’s going to be a ME video.

I’m not sure what the answers are, but one would definitely be improving the economy. With a war against Iran going, a war the public never asked for, consumer prices are not going to drop anytime soon.

In my life, old age isn’t as demeaning as I used to think. I can even love a woman younger than I, and I think she knows it. I am confident, relatively happy, mostly at peace, and I took down my YouTube channel. I’m not about ME; I’m far more interested in you. And I worry about, and pray for, all of you.

With a blizzard and stormy weather moving in later today, I’m very concerned. And though I may cuss a lot, look: I hate the things people do. I don’t hate anyone.

But a lot of the MEs out there do hate, and it begins with themselves. You can have no life if you hate yourself.

I recommend staying away from Patreon and learning to like yourself. Liking yourself doesn’t mean you’re a ME person. It just means you’ve sought peace, and you’re close to it.

Try to do something new and cool this weekend, and go to church this morning.

Be safe, I want you back here for the next post.