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Hello, Been watching videos of yours every once in a while. Love the content, mess with you heavy. When I reference you in conversation with friends, what pronouns should I use?
As a Latina who mainly watches Quackity, I can DEFINITELY attest to the racism in MCYT spaces. He got so much nastiness in his chat the first time he did a Spanish stream, and he's constantly portrayed in fanworks as either hyper-aggressive, hyper-sexualized, or nothing but comic relief. He had to call people out on stream once for spamming "El Chapo." It was... upsetting, to say the least.
PLEASE IM SO GLAD SOMEONE'S MENTIONED THIS-- it doesn't help either that quackity (unintentionally, which makes it even sadder) fed the flames with the whole "Mexican dream" bit and other jokes similar to that. I'm not saying it's his fault, as I and many other latinos make similar jokes, but when presented to an audience and space that is mostly white, it encourages them to start making the same jokes as well and they slowly turn from jokes laughing with you to laughing AT you.
Oh god i had no idea people were treatig Quackity like this, what the hell?? I watched some of his older content a long time ago and he seemed like the most wholesome guy ever, really funny too. He deserves so much better.
As a fellow Mexican, I also completely agree; hell, I made a WHOLE discussion and mini essay about the racism in communities like that. The way Spanish speakers and Quackity had to deal with people saying "I don't speak Taco Bell", people asking him for "las drogas", and hell, even the time he was with his friends back in Mexico and they were doing gritos and playing mariachi music, people were telling them to "stop barking" in chat. There is just nastiness in almost every corner of the MCYT community if you search hard enough. This is honestly why I don't engage anymore.
@@aloofm33rkat28 you should seriously not use the internet anymore if you can’t take a joke, everybody gets made fun of and they literally always make equivalent British jokes, get a grip man you live in a social media bubble
Wait...Billy Eilish stans harassed you over your body? Billy Eilish stans...whose idol has famously been subject to body-shaming internet harassment and suffered greatly for it? Pro-level cognitive dissonance on their part. So sorry that happened to you.
Recently, a tiktoker I really enjoyed got exposed for groping minors while in cosplay. Never once was my reaction "Oh no, I'm losing my favorite creator," it was always, "Oh my god, I trusted this person, I can't believe they would ever do something like that." Not ONCE did I ever defend them or not believe the victims. Dream stans need to learn how to be empathetic and stop thinking about themselves
honestly, whether or not dream is innocent of recent allegations i truly do hope this current situation serves as a wake up call for his fanbase to not be so stuck on defending a guy they ultimately truly don’t know on a personal level…
yea it’s definitely put in prospective (for me) that i really done know him as much as it seemed i did. it made me take a massive step back and start taking things as if i wasnt a fan and had saw everything going on.
Thats what freaked me out about the Dream fandom, they were so intensely parasocial and it was weird that Dream kinda fed into that instead of going through with “I don’t know you, you’re not my friend boundary.”
I 100% believe he did it. He’s manipulating his young fan base and its wrong to just blame all the child fans for being para social when he literally uses textbook gaslighting and bullying tactics to isolate mentally ill chronically online children
As someone who watches the community, the worst part is that it hasn’t and it probably won’t be. Rather, it seems to have been a rallying call for a lot of them, strengthening the “us against the rest of the world” mentality a lot of stans have with him. It’s frustrating to watch.
I'm now realizing that once I'm a parent the "parasocial relationships talk" should be included amongst all the other "talks" parents give their kids. When I was younger I was repeatedly warned about talking to strangers online, but influencer culture really tricks younger audiences into thinking they fully know the influencer. It removes the idea that the influencer is still a stranger, not their friend. No matter how often someone streams or posts or how happy and amazing they look online to thousands/millions of followers, you don't what happens behind closed doors and you do not have a real two-sided relationship with them. That could be so hurtful to a kid (or adult) who is lonely, but it is so important to know.
This is a really good point. It feels like the talk about internet safety stopped with the concept of predators posing as teens in chat rooms so they could lure kids.
for sure! now we need to make sure that when we warn our kids about how adults should and shouldn’t be interacting with them that includes online celebs and influencers. like we need to tell our kids that straight up it is inappropriate for a youtuber to add them on snapchat or compliment them on their appearance
it scares me that adults don’t know enough about the internet to be adequately protecting their kids. like the children at my middle school shouldn’t have been on omegle or messaging random old men on kik but no one’s parents even knew what those things were
As a lonely teenager I had a serious parasocial relationship with the Achievement Hunter team (mostly their let's plays crew). And that was mostly a positive experience for me, but there were times it did negatively effect me, times where they made a misogynistic comment and then the comments exploded and it became so apparent that as a teenage girl I wasn't really welcome in that space. And with hindsight it's easy to see what could have happened to me had I ever gone deeper and tried to make contact. It *did* happen to some of the teenage girls who did that. It probably helps to frame it as a kind of fictional realtionship. You like the persona they play, not the real person that are. Then it's no more dangerous than a parasocial relationship with Luke Skywalker or Katniss Everdeen.
As someone who actually enjoyed his content back in 2020 - Dream has consistently demonstrated he has an atrocious temperament. He reacts extremely poorly and aggressively to any perceived slight, which emotionally stirs up his fans and makes them feel even more loyal to him as ‘defenders’. Regardless of the truth to these allegations, Dream is an unstable and arrogant creator, making him a wildly irresponsible role model for a younger audience.
his nasty temperament affects a lot of the things he does. whenever he felt attacked or salty about mcc (minecraft championships) he would on occasion start making jabs at whatever other streamer he thought had done something unfair on stream. he’s competitive to the point of toxicity. when i was still into mcyt, the mcc hype was huge. every once in a while, clips of him acting immature and butthurt would get reposted across social media, and even though i never watched dream and his main friend group, these clips brought down the vibe of everybody involved with mcc- fans, staff, and other streamers. its very minor but i just remembered it and think it’s an interesting point. it happened no more than a couple times. but those couple times, the clips i saw were so bitter, he made subtle jokes with his friends on stream in a way that suggested they had ragged on their less-popular minecraft youtubers for a hours in discord calls. so bitter. over a regular monthly minecraft tournament hes always gonna be in, because he has millions of subscribers. nuts
I absolutely noticed this too!! I was into the dream SMP in 2020, but i never really liked dream himself. He always struck me as weirdly defensive and tempermental.
When you turn 18 you’re not automatically an adult. You don’t all of a sudden absorb a mature mentality when the clock strikes 12. These are still very young very impressionable people. I’m so sick of the “she may be in high school but she’s 18”. SHES IN HIGH SCHOOL.
Exactly!!! I get so sick when I see guys in their thirties date 18 year olds and claim its okay because they are "very mature" and an "adult". I unfortunately see it quite often.
Yeah! Like I'm only 20 going on 21 but I'm still super careful about the interactions I have online with 16-18-year-olds, even though we're relatively closer in age, I am the one with greater social power in that relationship, and I must be careful and responsible for the sake of both of us.
@@anitaremenarova6662 it literally is but the majority of people, specifically other men and boys, rather then helping these young boys either say, “oh if that was me i would’ve been grateful” or just str8 up getting mad at the double standard without helping or truly caring abt those young men at all. although can’t tell if your trolling or not atp
@@-miaumiau Not what I'm talking about. I'm saying that young guys that are legally adult are still just dumb children, not everyone is this groomer mastermind. This courtesy is however never extended to them, very misandrist of all of you.
A good way to gauge how a person really is, is to check their reaction to something that can be _perceived_ as bad - in Dream's case, his victory screech being misconstrued as offensive to Indigenous Americans and his reaction to that misconstruction. Instead of explaining to people that he was referencing Spongebob Squarepants, to which most people's reaction would have been, "Oh, alright." and moving on, for his gut reaction to be a tirade about how he's part Indigenous (Which, hey, he could be - we don't know) tells a lot about his personal character. I mean, most people would just go, "That's just from Spongebob." if the same thing happened to them. I know I would.
or (in my opinion slightly better and building on that idea) "it was a reference to spongebob, but I can understand why some folks might find it offensive and I will do my best to educate myself on those sorts of issues/avoid it in the future"
most people who suddenly say 'I'm part indigenous though!' as a defense for doing something that offends native Americans is usually sus, not even being able to pick a supposed tribe (Or country! America isn't the only place in the world with indigenous peoples) speaks to his character too imo
i find it odd how the whitest of white men somehow always suddenly claim to have "indigenous" in them the second theyre exposed for being racist... like ... alright kyle... 🧐
@@sora1498 I mean I do find it shocking just _how_ white he is. Like, I'm someone who's about as pale as a full bottle of Elmer's glue, and I think Dream has me beat on lack-of-pigment in our skin.
As a former dream stan I found that a lot of anti-semitism (I am not Jewish so I can’t claim to understand antisemitism) and white supremacy was rampant throughout the community the main reason I left. I remember constantly feeling bad for being a POC and when interacting with other POC individuals they too also pushed down their identities and idolising individuals because they were white. People talking about how only white people were attractive just a lot of insecurity and internalised racism. There was always this push of being progressive and POC friendly but again it was all performative no one actually cared and actually caring was defined as retweeting and liking a thread. I fell into a really deep self hatred hole because of how much I felt ashamed of my own ethnicity.
I think the fact that it is a comfort/safe place for people (a lot of them white) is a double edged sword in this regard. It doesn’t foster the environment for the hard (and oftentimes political) conversations around modern racism. It’s a hard pill to swallow. Being the ignorant and complaint majority of an oppressive system. Especially when many seeking out comfort due to struggles associated similarly unjust systems of a different cause.
As a former lonely teen who used the internet as comfort, I appreciatte the compassionate tone of this video and the questions you raise. We aren't taught that we can love something and still be critical of it, still see the less-good or bad parts and try to correct them. Now, more than ever, it's important that we are kind to one another and learn to think with nuance about our world and all of the intersections in it. Thank you so much Rose, you may be the woman that convinces me to try a really dramatic eyeliner
I hate being trans on the internet, and on UA-cam. It's the one thing stopping me from making a channel about living the low-tech life. You inspire me every day.
I’m not trans but I hope you’re able to do it if it’s a passion of yours. You deserve to start a UA-cam channel just like the rest of us! I’ve had these thoughts just because I’m not conventionally attractive (not comparing the two). The internet can be such a brutal place.
I feel like it should be noted that a massive creator interacting on a 1-on-1 private impermanant space like snapchat with a fan who met them through being a fan of their work is an inappropriate interaction. There is a hard power dynamic built into that relationship, even if they were both adults. I'd compare it to an inappropriate relationship between a college professor and a student- even though both parties are adults, there is an inherent difference in power between the teacher and the student, even if that person is no longer a student of the professor.
yep there is genuinely just no reason someone would do it unless they want to leverage the admiration the fan feels for them to get something that they would not be comfortable asking for in any other open space. there are too many other ways to interact with your fans if your intentions are above-board that are both more convenient and dont immediately seem sketchy
exactly, it really reminds me of the callmecarson situation in that aspect (obviously, the details are different, but each controversy was based on the power dynamic), fascinating how such a similar situation has such different responses, and a part of me feels like it has something to do with their appearance (or at least in dream's case, perceived fan appearance). because dream is twitter's golden boy it's like the opposite side of the same coin
@Nightingale V I think the reason why Carson got booted is because the people who exposed him were his former content creator friends (aka Lunch Club, Goop, and for a short period Fart Club). Note the fact that since this allegation came to light, absolutely nobody close to Dream has left him like Lunch Club did to Carson. A massive part of what informs public opinion on these types of situations is how the people closest to the accused react. For example, during the recent situation with Mizkif on Twitch, his streamer org (OTK) had him temporarily removed while they investigated what exactly happened. If OTK had stated the opposite and defended Miz's character, then public opinion would likely be swayed in favor of Mizkif.
I do wonder now about if a fan/ celebrity relationship would ever be a fair dynamic. That’s a really interesting thing to think about, like does that make a celebrity who chooses to date a fan weird 100% of the time.
I was one of the people who filled out the survey. I'm an ex dream stan and I'm really glad you made this video. When I was a stan, the community believed victims. We were open to criticism. But only on a surface level. Most of us couldn't bare being without the content from our cc's, and would move on as soon as we could. But even then, looking at what the minecraft youtuber community is now is just a reflection of how unhealthy I was, but even worse. They have created a hostile, toxic environment full of hypocrites. Back in the day, dream stans used to attack and body shames tons of other creators, but it's only bad now when it happens to Dream, for example. That's just an example of how terrible it is. This video has amazing points about how no one should be afraid to post (as his stans would call it) "dream neg" or even just a video about dream. The community would literally run stans off the platforms if you joked about him CHEATING (in mc, which... he did). Great vid Ro! Since this is gaining traction I thought I’d write a little more about my personal experiences. I made a lot of friends, and as Ro said the community is a really accepting place for queer people such as myself and during this time I finally labelled my sexuality and gender id. However, I was so so unhealthy. It was during the pandemic and I was barely doing school because I was spending 24/7 devoted to dream and co. I had 4k+ followers on twitter for being a stan. I thought that my attachment was normal. I would donate to them because it meant they would basically acknowledge you. I’m so grateful I left, I was miserable but convinced myself I was fine. The community is a huge echo chamber that validates and glorifies unhealthy behaviors like mine. Just thought I’d share my experience for the hell of it :) Sorry if this is a huge ramble
@@aff77141 Kid you not when it came out that he cheated people made almost no noise about it in the community… people did not care. Which, I mean I don’t really care that he cheated still it’s more all of the deflection and disproving he tried to do and leading his fans on with trust in him only to end up a cheater 😭
i will be honest ive been in the fandom since late 2020 i wasnt really following lore at the time and i didnt really donate to streams or anything but im still in it. i do agree theres a toxic side to the fandom but i dont think its much to the fault of dream... i actually find myself feeling bad for him im around his age and i cant imagine having a fandom that big and no real way to control it. no commonality between these people other than you. hes not a perfect person but i do empathize with that part of his situation a lot.
I’m an ex mcyt fan, Aphmau specifically. I remember slowly fading away from her content as it started to change and then finding out what she had done. The idealization of predatory relationships, the subtle racism, the queer baiting, and more. I’m so embarrassed to tell anyone I used to be obsessed with her content because I know how people react. I was a kid and she was the only content creator I felt cared for by (being a young, queer, nd, traumatized kid). I was enamoured by the fantasy aspects, and the community; and I can only have empathy for dsmp fans. I know what it’s like to be so attached to a character a creator puts on to the point of obsession. I want those who are afraid of leaving the fandom to know that you aren’t at fault for attaching yourself to a creator, but it’s your responsibility to realize that these communities don’t actually care for you and your friends.
Damn kinda feel like the reason why i drop her is stupid now i drop her cause literally she didn't choose neither luarence and garroth in her old minecraft diaries
@@SaphInfection Aaron was three years older then Aph when they were in high school. She was a freshmen and he was a Senior, which is super illegal. (She was 15, he was 18) In regards to Queer baiting, there are SO many instances where two guys are put in a queer situation (Think Dante and Aaron kissing on accident, Laurence and Garroth kissing on accident) and then you add in Laurence and Garroth literally living together, being “best friends” and “roommates” (queer calling cards), it’s clear that Jessica only did this to entice a queer audience even though they never actually got together. Plus the only main MLM (man loving man) relationship in Mystreet being with a man just named “Guy” and his unknown boyfriend. Also, the ONLY queer woman we really see (Katelyn) ending up in a straight relationship. Not saying bi women have to get with other women, but she is quite literally the only not-straight woman I can think of from mystreet and that’s an issue. There’s also the entire KC being based on super racist Japanese stereotypes (think the “kawaii” school girl”), the normalization of assaulting men (the Pizza Delivery Guy from S1, and just lazy writing (like Travis being Aphs bff in high school but suddenly not remembering her in mystreet)
It is genuinely mental to me that Ro is only 21. Wtf?? I wish I had had half the wisdom+ability to articulate my thoughts, holy cow. You are doing so great, hon - always cheering you on :D
Ro's out there out-comedianing and out-insighting 30+ y.o. people and retaining my attention like a Pokemon game, it's marvelous to behold a master wordsmith.
your comment is sweet and i belive you have 100% good intentions but you should know "hon" is a slur trans women call other trans women who don't pass well, just so you know in the future. I would use Hun instead :)
I remember when Taylor Swift got an 8/10 rating on Pitchfork and her fans doxxed the journalist involved. I wish Taylor would've spoken out against this - even if she didn't ask them to, it happened on multiple occassions and she should've condemned that behaviour. Her fans also harassed ex-boyfriends and sent them death threats without a peep from her. I guess the moral of the story is that fans will act like you are a heretic for any criticism against their gods.
her fans definitely engage in cultish behavior and she knows it but would never say anything or try to stop it, she seems to like it that way, considering her fans have "helped" her clean her name when rightfully accused of something
Taylor is against bullying only when it affects her. Her fandom bullies people (her exes, critics) and she never stops it even when her fans overstep their boundaries
@@Anonymous-bi5pv I'm totally guessing here but I would assume @ ihvy might be referring to "accusations" (there's a lot of documented proof but we'll put it in quotes) of Taylor dating a 17-18 year old when she was in her early 20s and going as far as to buy a house next to his after they'd only been together for a couple months. He was a Kennedy and she'd also been publicly obsessing over the family for at least a year before she started dating him, and at the time he was her only conceivable "in" to the family which had clearly been a long term goal of hers. It was...... very fucking bizarre to say the least, whether or not he was 18 when they started dating she's like 5 years older than him, which is a large age gap when you're in your late teens-early 20s. Fans have deflected this behavior by claiming that Taylor was just "overcorrecting" after being in relationships with much much older men as a 19-20 year old. And to be fair John Mayer was very weird/focused on her while she was still a teenager/barely legal before they started dating, and I don't want to deligitimize her experiences in that situation because it was not appropriate or okay in the slightest, but that doesn't like.... magically make her behavior better, either. Both can be fucked up at the same time. And if OP wasn't referring to that, then several of her 1989 era music videos were accused of being racist (specifically anti-black, in the form of cultural appropriation and glamorizing the colonial period) which was highly documented and people have discussed it better than me. Her fans also have excuses for those videos because of course. And if it isn't THAT I don't even know, maybe the private plane thing lmao
I'm a swift fan for her music and... Yeah. This is 100% true. Obviously there's been false accusations (kimye 💀 or Demi being like 'Tay doesn't support Britney' when Taylor had actually donated money to her legal team for years) and her name did get dragged through the mud in 2016 but that doesn't mean that there's no room for legitimate criticism. Tbf lots of swifties I followed on twitter condemned the private jet use, and the fans doing the dogpiling are in the 0.1%, but its still unacceptable. Edit: Also Taylor seems to have withdrawn from all socials apart from tiktok, but she should still be aware of the behaviour of her twitter fans, cos ignoring what they do in your name isn't a strategy
I will never forget when I saw clips of Dream going on a stream and saying doxxing “wasn’t that bad”. As if it’s not an actual crime. As if it’s not still actively putting someone’s life in danger. Tbh if this isn’t him trying to send hints of encouragement to doxx, idk what is
Dream said that out of personal experience, and he said doxxing is bad IN THE SAME STREAM. He said it’s rare to have people come over to your house if you get doxxed.
oh man, this made me think a LOT about the ways that autistic people specifically are mocked for the way we discuss our interests. I've been thinking abt it recently -- being someone with incredibly strong interests in things, particularly ones deemed "immature", means you're ostracized and thought of as weird. obv special interests can be around someone really nasty, or can consume your life to a point that's no longer healthy, but even healthy and normative ways that autistic ppl express our affection for something is demeaned by greater society. even other neurodivergent ppl tend to turn on autistic ppl when we discuss the ways we are specifically looked down upon. also, for whatever reason, a lot of fringe interests (being a furry comes to mind) are dominated by autistic ppl, and as a result a lot of the bullying and abuse they face intersects w/ autistm-specific ableism. I haven't thought abt this enough to make it a greater point but it's something that I'm so regularly upset about. It can be very hard for autistic people to hear criticisms of things we like, b/c those interests are so core to ourselves and b/c we're oftentimes mocked for them, so I particularly understand why someone might want to avoid criticisms of things they like. hell, I have special interests in shows I know are bad writing-wise (and have some uhhhhh Problematic episodes) and seeing ppl talk about why they don't particularly like it hurts. I hope all the autistic Dream stans can get more healthy, less parasocial special interests. I feel very lucky as someone on the spectrum that, while I've had some weird phases, I've been able to mostly stay in the realm of what I consider healthy interests for myself. obv the "getting personally offended when someone says they don't like a pretty mid-tier show" is nnnot great, but y'know, I'm working on it. Also please find someone to stan who doesn't hate us and minimize our experiences, that would be great
Mine is Antartica, the time I jad an argument about it was my family being sure it was not a continent. And talking like I was dumb because they're 5 to think that and I'm alone.
yeah, as a current hermitcraft/empires fan and former dream smp fan, a lot of dream fans can be unnecessarily toxic. the hermitcraft/empires smp fandom is imo a lot more safe and accepting especially for people of color and disabled people, and the ccs are much better at interacting with their fanbase and even the hardcore stans (which are few and far between) aren’t half as intense as dream stans. i can’t speak to other people’s experiences but i was only in the dream smp fandom for a little while before i discovered that dream stans exist, and that very quickly made me officially decide that that fandom wasn’t going to be a safe space for me. i was far removed from the dream smp fandom when the allegations came out, so it didn’t really affect me much. however i did see a couple of my tumblr mutuals who were somewhat engaged in the dream smp, and who belived the victim, and they got it pretty hard from the toxic dream stans. a lot of them decided to leave the dream smp fandom permanently, and one even disavowed mcyt altogether. i haven’t said anything about it on tumblr except reblog a few posts because i don’t want the dream fans to attack me. i know how the dream stans can be, and you’re really brave for talking about it ro.
I can second the experience with hermitcraft, I wrote a long comment and had to restart but creators like xisuma, falsesymmetry mumbojumbo and others all struck me as very responsible and emotionally mature, at least when I was watching minecraft content- and trust me, that might genuinely equate to an entire year of my life in watchtime over like a 7 year period and I’m probably not the only one. Mindcrack was another one, kurtjmac, aureylian, omgchad, ethoslab, zisteau etc. Point is that although there is a lot of mind-numbing, hyperactive minecraft content on youtube that’s rather shamelessly exploiting the short attention spans of kids and certain symptoms of neurodivergence, profiting on v-bucks scam equivalents, creators being creepy or straight up grooming, etc, at least from my experience there were always very open, accepting, and mature communities that usually felt comfortable for me, although I admit most communities would be for someone like me. I think regardless of whether he deserves the title or not, Dream seems to be very much a figurehead of that hyperactive groomer interpretation of mcyt, even if someone like me (who was really turned off by that side of youtube and even moreso now that I’m older) doesn’t believe that that image fairly describes the majority of minecraft youtube creators.
i am also more of an empires/hermitcraft fan, and i don't really watch dream smp content (or content from most people on the server). it always kind of rubbed me the wrong way. i prefer the nostalgic and far more accepting communities of minecraft, and there are so many creators that are really great. sometimes it sucks though when minecraft creators you like still support/interact with dream and others (like actively try to, i get your in the same area if a creator happens to be in a large vc and hes in thats kinda whatever to me). anyways dream stans are so scary, and i hate the way he doesn't even make an attempt to stop them. also that thread ro linked has really changed my view on a lot of creators i thought were alright.
I actually recently got into hermitcraft and empires after watching the life series and I would have to say it does seem better. For one, a lot of the creators are older and more established in their careers which I think helps them deal with the negative effects of having a fandom, and although I think there are negative aspects to the community they seem to have an overall positive relationship with it. Also, any problematic things they've said or done seem to be things from the past that have been apologized for and views that have changed, but even then the ones that have these issues at all seem to be few and far between. I do think it sucks that the dsmp has gotten so big that creators who have been around for far longer have had their careers and fanbases defined by others based on something out of their control, but the popularity of the dsmp has also helped overall mcyt so it's probably mostly positive for them. I think there are still problems with this kind of parasocial behavior in all of these communities, but I don't think that's necessarily the creators faults and may in part come from this sort of new culture we've had with mcyt and overall fandom for a while now, as well as just like. Human nature which we can't really change but we can try to recognize and manage I do have empathy for certain dream stans though. I get very strong hyper fixations and though I try to engage in a more healthy way, seeing criticism of something I love can hurt and make me feel like I'm bad for ever loving it... And that's talking about things like seeing criticism for Steven Universe and the Magnus Archives, something where I recognize that I really shouldn't feel like that. So I can't imagine how something like this feels for some of these people
An interesting note about this! I feel like the reactions people had in the DSMP fandom to the allegations had a lot to do with what specific cc’s you follow. I was and am a kinda casual fan when compared to some people in the fandom, but I was still pretty active when everything went down, so I saw some shit. But, the thing is, I’m an SBI fan. I didn’t really interact with many Dream Stan’s. I saw lots of people disown him, I saw a lot of people saying to believe the victims, and even a lot of people removing his character from fics and comics or just said they’d always portray him as a villian. Lots of “if you support Dream, get out” kinda shit. This doesn’t really add anything, but I hope it might bring you a little more peace regarding the fandoms reaction to this specific event; A lot of people were great about it. That being said, I’m very sorry that there were so many assholes that fucked with you; it may be a hollow apology, but it’s a problem you should never have had to deal with. Shits fucked.I hope that you’re happy over in hermitcraft/empires :) I hope it’s less stressful, has less racists, and that you have fun! The fanart looks sick ;)
You know the basic life tips we're all taught as children, stuff like stranger danger, don't do drugs etc? We should add "celebrities are not your friends" to that.
I’m glad you made this video even if it might cause backlash from Dream fans. I think this is something important to talk about. We can’t just blindly defend creators, and it’s really upsetting that people build parasocial relationships with their fans that are so strong that they could do almost anything and “get away with it” so to speak. I think it’s important we talk about why that’s wrong.
for context I’m a queer, indigenous, person who falls under the trans umbrella, I also have autism and ADHD I used to be in the Dream SMP fandom [~July 2020 - September 2021] however I wasn’t into Dream and I’ve gotta say, this was the worst fandom experience I’ve ever had, even during my time in the Dream SMP community, I never liked him [I was more into Wilbur Soot and Fundy] and at some point I mentioned my dislike for him after the indigenous war cry incident and how he handled it, I did this on Twitter, what does Twitter do? dogplie, what happened to me? I got dogpiled. I was spammed gore, death threats, doxxing threats, people threatened my reptiles, called me slurs and so much more. overtime near the end of my hyperfixation I drew fanart for the Dream SMP less and less and began drawing more of my new hyperfixation, and got backlash for that! it was pure insanity, I have many other stories, but I thought I’d talk about that one in particular, since it stuck with me a lot, I’m mostly desensitized to gore but it shocked me with how fine people were with sending me it, I feel so bad for people who are still in the community, I do hope they leave, it can be hard if it’s a hyperfixation but it improved my mental health so much and I hope things go well for those who are leaving/recently left the fandom, same goes for those who left the fandom awhile ago [very sorry for weird English, it’s my second language, it’s 4 AM and UA-cam mobile sucks]
Holy hell I'm so sorry you went through that, what a vile way to treat someone. It's insane how comfortable people are with switching into full-on, unironic villain behavior when they think theyre "defending" someone (who is not only objectively in the wrong but also doesn't know they exist and doesnt give 2 shits about them.)
omg how dare you, an indigenous POC, have an opinion on a racist thing he did /sar jokes aside, that was really shitty and im so sorry that happened to you!!
I feel like despite the satire this comment section is actually talking about this in a somewhat mature manner rather than just “dream fan bad. Dream fan die” a lot of dream fans are just misguided kids, and not everyone who likes the dream smp actually likes dream. After seeing the way he handled his conflicts I couldn’t really find it in me to respect him and I had been a dream smp fan for over a year. I still like the smp story at least for the earlier days and I still like the dynamics between Wilbur and his friends and enjoy “bench trio / sbi” side of the smp but I’ve kinda grown past it
@@anitaremenarova6662 I got into it bc of an animatic I saw for the mind electric and I was curious about what the animatic meant so I watched wilburs playlist and it was super cool and fun but I never really cared much about dream
imo, no creator at dream's size should EVER talk like that with fans, platonically or romantically. no matter what, there is going to be an inevitable power dynamic that just cant be avoided and it is no good for ANYONE. dream is constantly irresponsible with his fans and enables their horrific behaviour which is why i can never, EVER feel sympathy or believe him.
I dont know if you know him but another UA-cam creator called philza sometimes gives advice to new streamers or people of that kind and he does that knowing his platform and their dynamic and I think that that is the only way to engage 1 on 1 with fans
ro, you are the most eloquent, beautiful and audacious (in a good way obv) creator on youtube. i love watching your videos and hearing your takes. standing up against dream stans can’t be easy. you go, girl 🖤
I will say, a lot of people forget about Anastasia, who was the first person to come out with her story. This is because she's been completely inactive on Twitter. She privated her account because she was receiving mass harassment and death threats. Amanda hasn't been active, but she is getting legal help so it makes sense. So many people harassed her snd her account is still public. I really do hope those two are alright.
And Manatreed situation wasn’t even false 💀 most of the older fans understand and know that it’s true but that Dream couldn’t confirm it without doxing himself. Younger fans to this day believe Manatreed was innocent, and exactly the same kind of separation happened with the recent allegations too :\
Regardless of whether the allegations are true or not, the way that people were so quick to harass the victims + try to rip their stories apart for some popular UA-cam guy they barely know is really upsetting, especially considering that they'd ruin other creators they're less attached to for more "mundane" reasons. As an autistic person who hyperfixates on creators I like, I believe there's a very fine line between simply hyperfixating and being dependent on someone for ALL of your happiness. It frustrates me seeing just how wrapped around his finger Dream's fanbase seem to be + the lack of attempt from Dream to properly establish boundaries that will reduce harm is also not great. I know there are many fans/ex-fans who just want to see Dream improve and will keep giving him the benefit of the doubt because they're so used to investing time and effort into someone who couldn't possibly return it no matter how many "I love yous" he says. I am so happy that you made this video. I hope that the situation will open some people's eyes and they'll realize just how absorbed in their more-than-parasocial bubble they have become.
I agree so much with your first point!!! he lacks tact and even if by some miracle the allegations are false (which he quite literally admitted that they weren’t) his response was highly telling of his character. his response to controversies in general has always been similar in that he doesn’t truly admit to wrongdoings, and the “hes young and can’t manage such quick rise to fame” excuse can only get you so far. at some point you have to take responsibility, and even comparing other white boy minecrafters handling their controversies, they manage to hold some tact and at least make a formal apology. its just wild to me that one of the biggest faces in the scene is also one of the most irresponsible and tactless especially with his fanbase, like you said
"try to rip their stories apart"...you mean proving them false? Because falsely accusing someone of something as serious as grooming can ruin not only their reputation, but their LIFE, AND IS A HORRIBLE THING TO DO??
I really empathize with these fans because I used to have a huge parasocial relationship with One Direction back in the day - I was deeply unhappy with my environment in real life so I felt I had to form an attachment with five random dudes. I noticed focusing on what made me happy in real life and finding fulfillment there brought me out of this submersion in stan culture. However, it took me a lot of time to get there, and I noticed I'll slip back into parasocial attachment if I'm particularly struggling mentally - fortunately, it's at most a tiny fraction of what it used to be. Thank you for another beautifully empathetic and nuanced video Ro :)
Well done on getting out of that mentality, I can imagine how hoard it must have been when your happiness is dependent on celebrities, especially when the fan base is quite dependent on each other. I will say that I'd love to see a dissection on the whole fan x 1D parasocial relationship and the nuances with how 1D were hated cos the forefront of their fan base were mostly teenage girls as well as how it came to be like that.
You really have a wonderful way with words, Ro. Sometimes it almost sounds more like you’re reciting poetry than a commentary piece. The way you deliver things feels so powerful yet it doesn’t get too pretentious.
i was a dream stan for about 2 years, I'm a queer poc so when I first joined the fandom I felt like it was one of the most accepting communities I had ever been a part of (mind you I was 17 and going through a cluster fuck of identity crises). but as time went on I found that the deeper you went into the community, the more it showed its true colors. racism, transphobia, antisemitism, it was like a little cocktail of how far people were willing to go to defend a man they ultimately didn't know. last yeamucr dream said something about getting a thrill out of quote-retweeting people that openly criticized him on twitter that was terrifying, and it pushed me to leave the community. I loved dream and his content, and I wish I could said I had a clean slate when I left the community, but the truth is that I was an angry stan too, I got very defensive over anything mildly negative related to dream and I refused to see anything beyond what I was conditioned to think by the creator and the community. I can say these things in retrospect but ofc back then I thought that it was normal and healthy, and I was just having fun. but I really do hope people, stans, start understanding that criticism isn't hate.
37:00 it almost seems like with these fandoms theres a sunk* cost fallacy. They received so much hate for being in the community that the community and creator has to be worth it Edit:typo
im not sure if its a typo and im truly not trying to be rude, its the sunk cost fallacy. named so bc it references the amount time/money/effort that people dedicate or 'sink' into something. i really think you are on to something here. ro makes a good point about people wanting to keep being able to consume things that comfort them, but i do think there are some people who react from a place where they're so invested they dont feel like they can divest themselves from it, for a multitude of reasons
As an ex mcyt and dream fan people inside and outside of the fandom NEED to look at the way these creators talk about accountability. So much of the allegations or offensive clips that are brought up against the creators are dismissed by the fandom for trying to get them "cancelled" and the reason this response is so common is because of the mcyt creators! Their language and tone when addressing criticism and allegations is downright manipulative to a certain degree. Accountability is thrown to the wind when they tell their fans the people who believed the victims are "gullible" and "band wagoners", even going so far as to say the victims making accusations are "clout chasers" who want attention. I honestly have more empathy for the fandom because of this rhetoric that is constantly fed to them by not just the creators, but their own fans. UA-cam accounts dedicated to dismissing allegations made against these creators with hundreds of thousands of subscribers and stans constantly talking about how sweet and kind their favorite creator is and how they couldn't possibly have done something wrong all add up to a toxic and unhealthy response to criticism and allegations. If you are reading this and are part of the mcyt and dream fandom please PLEASE watch this video in its entirety with an open mind, and think critically when others in your fandom are dismissing issues being brought up.
@@silverdrag0n_ I said that his comment was an example of the PROBLEM, I'm not a jschlatt fan and I was using his quote as an example of UA-camrs language when addressing allegations and such.
if the allegations are true or not, it doesnt matter. the way that dreams stans reacted to the victim coming forward, completley tearing them apart shows that they are not supportive to victims. if this turns oit to be true or not to be true, if this happens again (or happens for the first time) then the victim is way less likely to come forward after seeing how they responded. most dream stans scare me because they are just so ride or die for some dude on the internet that they do not even know
@@theboondoggliest That saying is more for people who come out of the woodwork with a massive twitter thread alleging they’ve been groomed. You have to do an investigation on that kind of thing because there have been way too many times where the allegations where proven false.
@@guyferrari8124 idk if im just not understanding what your saying but in every grooming or SA situation there has to be an investigation, not believing or supporting a victim even when you dont have all the details perpetuates the mindset that SA and grooming survivors arent telling the truth, and lead to people who have gone through this with no support (which is something that happens extremely often, speaking from experience). Im not saying that people who DO lie about stuff like this are good people, theyre not, they damage peoples belief in actual victims, but the number of false allegations are extremly small in comparison go true allegations. So yes, believe the victim
@@theboondoggliest Listen, I’ve been in the twitter dramasphere through a few fandoms and I will tell you there has been enough times where somebody tries to get someone thrown to the twitter dogs for false grooming allegations for reasons that can range from monetary to petty to personal gain that you can’t take anything at face value. This goes for both sides as well, as you can’t immediately believe someone once they put out a defense. Serious claims like these need to be taken with nuance because they can ruin lives. (Not saying that’s what’s happening with dream, I’m talking in general)
to me, Dream looks like a local community college cafeteria lurker. like he’s just always there playing dnd or playing a gameboy idk I’m pretty stoned and this is my truth
One of the biggest problems I have with Dream is how he manipulates his very big, young and impressionable audience, by feeding into this unhealthy parasocial narrative that helps cultivate some absolutely outrageous behavior, like harrassment, doxxing, etc. I'm not saying Dream is responsible for the unsaviory actions of every single stan made on his behalf, but due to the size and age-range of his fanbase, he does carry a great responsibility for how he interacts with them. A responsibility which he doesn't seem to care about, based on how little he actually acknowledges these very serious things his fans has done, even making fun of others for caring about it. In short, Dream reads to me as the type of guy that believes he's above others, and likes manipulating people into thinking the same without facing the consequences (just look at the Minecraft speedrun fiasco, for instance). Sorry for the rant, but I just had to get it out there, u know?
I don't have anything to really to add to the discussion. Just that when you ended the video with "I hope your life gets better", I audibly said "Thanks Ro. I hope yours does too." Sometimes when your life is absolute shit, you just need a complete stranger wishing you well to help it feel a little less shit. We're all going through something.
I think you were really kind and empathetic to Dream stans, more than I've seen from any content creator. If they bully you they didn't watch the video because this was a breath of fresh air. And speaking of fresh air, and fridge biohazards I currently have a bag of what is just mold now because I wanted to see what happened to some cheese that was slightly moldy, I found it yesterday after nearly a year. I'm an adult with a child
As someone who briefly had a small Twitch following (15-20 viewers) it is incredibly obvious 1. If someone following you is a child and 2. How you should NOT speak to that person knowing that they are a child. Those with lower levels of maturity are extremely easy to differentiate and I made it a point as a streamer to ban anyone who seemed too immature for discord from my server. It is really not very difficult to set boundaries between yourself and younger viewers. Then again, maybe that’s why I will never be as popular as Dream, I had too many boundaries. 😅
I'd like to genuinely thank you for portraying parasocial relationships in a whole, not just "ur weird if u feel like this". Especially as someone with a horribly personal connection with one of the creators youve mentioned in this video (jschlatt. yeah, i know.) relationships like this are so fucked, and my attatchment to jschlatt has genuinely fucked me up horribly. Ive spent countless nights crying and hating myself both for liking him and for not being him. its not his fault, but in the case of Dream it absolutely is.
Dream has some weird takes but it's generally true that your allegations should be well organised into a single timeline and contain bulletproof evidence. After the string of blatantly false allegations against other people on the dsmp it goes without saying you won't be taken seriously unless you actually prove what you're claiming.
@@anitaremenarova6662 I had no evidence when my rapist raped me. Nothing to get people to believe me. I refused to get police involved because we’re both trans people and there’s a chance it could’ve gone really bad, plus they likely wouldn’t have believed me and would’ve done nothing as they usually do. So I have nothing except my word. It was just me and them, except one time my partner was a witness.
@@guytrashgurtdog But Dream did not rape anyone. All of his wrongdoings should be digitally archived. Why isn't the accuser providing those? You're conflating two different things here.
im starting to feel like my comments on your videos are getting repetitive, but i just cannot stress what a talented writer you are. i am a former dsmp fan and the way you described the shame i feel abt it now is very accurate. this was great
genuinely thank u sm for this video, ive been a fan of creators who are only associated with him and never been a personal fan of him so ive always been critical of his behaviors (especially as a poc) while being intrinsically aware of his actions but it was frustrating because any criticism of him always ignored nuances and didnt account for the demographic of the fan bases, immediately dismissing the valid communities built. this gave room for him to build even more parasocial relationships as he was able to dismiss ALL critique as mindless hate, which was seen in the recent allegations. so glad you brought up his twitlonger because he has a tendency to bring up buzzwords and never truly apologize. he deflects and minimizes, so while he definitely admitted to, at best, something highly irresponsible, he was able to skew it by making it seem as if it wasn’t that bad to which his stans take it as an immediate pass for the entire situation. another mcyt named bizly has been critical of dream before and when the allegations came out, he had pointed out that even if the claims were false, it is still highly irresponsible and inconsiderate to immediately go “they’re fake cant hear you” and go on the defensive, and in the past bizly has also discussed the parasocial relationships dream harbors and he had faced massive amounts of harassment for it (bringing this up just to show that even when members of his own social circle speak out against it, dream still manages to escape scott free) ((also dream hardly truly utters the words “i’m sorry” as in all his apologies he manages to deflect some of the blame, and truly never attempted to quell his fans from attacking bizly)) it’s infuriating that he is such a prominent name, considering the mcyt scene is so vast and harbors some of the most diverse gaming communities (which there is still not much in the name of diversity sometimes but by comparison, mcyt is leagues ahead of other gaming scenes) and there is just always an association with him, and whats a bit odd to me is that not even that long ago everyone was so keen to dismiss and hate on dream for arbitrary things (his sexuality, his fanbase demographic, the speedrun) but the silence surrounding actual harmful acts? very sinister. sorry for the long comment, just genuinely so glad there is someone so eloquent actually speaking about this and taking into account the nuances
ANOTHER BIZLY FAN IN THE WILD‼️‼️ i know this is off topic to your comment but out of curiosity do you listen to just roll with it as well??? i dont have any social media for the most part and never get to talk to people about the podcast WAHAHA
@@ARACHNIDPARTY i only watche the jrwi podcast with wilbur in it and that was a while ago im sorry 😭but i do see a pretty tight knit fanbase for it on tumblr if u ever wish to venture there :]
Ayy, same boat here mate! Not a direct fan but A fan of people who associate with him. You made some great points; I hope you’re doing well ♥️ I need to check out Bizly I guess lmao
This is probably the most compassionate video on the topic of fandoms I've ever seen. Almost nobody starts or ends with the acknowledgement that just because "fandom" has become a marketable, sellable-to category in the public eye that people still get bullied for being.... nerds, essentially. I feel for these kids. A lot of my childhood and teenhood was the same, it just happened offline, I was just existing and liking a thing and almost never even talking about it to anyone because.... talking about it just got me mocked. It got me branded, it got me isolated, it got me denied access to social groups because I was somehow doing something wrong by having fun and enjoying myself. And the bullying is so much worse now because of the way it can be decentralised, a dozen people can be tweeting at you to off yourself and that's a much smaller mental burden on THEM and a much greater one on the victim. And the rest of it... well, trust Ms Ramdin to have the best takes and a compassionate perspective on the way people are bad, sometimes. Between this and the JDvsAH video, I'm no longer surprised by the nuance, I'm simply... enjoying it. It's like a pressure valve, hearing someone make things that make sense.
I really love this video, I've been in so many fandoms that have been made fun of all the time (kpop, anime, etc.) And it really encapsulates why the reaction to allegations and insults are so personal. It's a usually very unhealthy attachment where you don't know where your Fandom self ends and when your real self begins. It becomes such a big part of you that any attack against what you enjoy is an attack on your own self. I really appreciate the respect you gave people in this video -t hough I don't expect less haha, it's still well appreciated since people are so quick to judge and hate on people in fandoms as they're easy targets, especially since their reactions can be quite emotional.
When I was a dream watcher I related to him and the way he dealt with controversy, but fortunately I was old enough to recognize that within myself and see it as a red flag. I like to be right. I have been the powerful one in relationships, and, despite my best intentions, I have hurt people. I'm lucky enough to not be a public figure and to be young, still learning and growing from my past toxic relationships. What I have done in the past hurt people, and I was also hurt. Being idolized by someone is very fun until you realize you have become their everything, and suddenly your actions have a lot more consequences than they did before. Thankfully I recognized those imbalances in my own relationships and isolated myself from them. I am still learning what healthy attachment looks like, and I'm happier now than I have been in a while. I do not defend dream. There is no excuse for his behavior and how it's been perpetuated over the years, especially given his status and track record. The fact that he doesn't have a PR team is continuously staggering. I do understand him though, and I think that's what made me ultimately detach from the fanbase. The amount of obsession about him as a person is not healthy for him or his viewers. He cultivates a cult-like culture because it feels good and gets him money. I genuinely don't think he thinks about the effects that has on him or the psyche of his very young fanbase. I hope dream is deplatformed, or at the very least that his current methods change. He consistently causes harm with his actions (though I believe he doesn't intend to) and that's grossly negligent and scummy. It's reflective of Twitter culture to its natural conclusion. Deifying people who want to be deified leads to power imbalances and abuse. It's not safe and it's not healthy, but it is incredibly attractive. (Tangent I think it's pretty funny that dream's character in the Minecraft roleplay is literally a god with a poor conception of boundaries)
I know ro probably won't see this but the ending of this video stopped me from going back to a toxic relationship.. I don't think ro could ever realized how much some simple sentences she has said have helped me so so much.... or how some unglamourized experiences she has had (like with ocd), make me feel truely understood on a real level that I have never found anywhere else.. I hope some part of her knows that SHE TOO is the parasocial comfort youtuber and distraction from life, for at least one person going through a terrible time. ❤
happy to say i scrolled through all the comments in this video (bc i have nothing better to do) and out of 1.3k comments, 8 were hate comments. as a fan of dream myself, this was a really good and educational video. this whole grooming situation really made me step back and be able to criticize a lot of the ways dream responds to controversy. your videos are a delight to watch, as always
I started doing the same thing and I’m so happy you went through 1000 comments first esp because I go through the replies too. I’m so glad there’s only been 8. I could feel Ro’s anxiety radiating through the screen. I hope that’s as far as it goes. Ro was so brave to do this. I know nothing about Minecraft but just through other YT videos over the years I’m aware of Dream and how dedicated his stans are and you don’t want to mess with them. It’s good to see you said you were a fan and not a stan. There lies a big difference esp if people now know where “stan” originated from and it’s not good. Thanks for doing the work!
Ro, your roasts and run on jokes kill me every time. You're so creative and funny. Every insult/roast makes me laugh more as they compound on each other. You have a wonderful balance of comedic and serious and I really like it!
as a former dream stan, i want to thank you for making this video. although i didnt get the chance to fill out the survey (which is totally okay sending it out so many times was crazy), i was looking forward to this because i knew you would be able to provide the level of nuance needed for this topic, and you absolutely delivered. you hit the nail on the fucking head. wonderful video as always, stay safe !
I'm not even a dream fan but the part toward the end where you're telling people they aren't destined to be hated, alienated, or ostracized for their mental health and identity made me cry. Not to be doing the thing in the video and getting weirdly parasocial here, but as a nonbinary person who is very much only really dealing with my mental health and untangling these things in my twenties, i just want you to know how much I appreciate your content, the way you articulate your thoughts on these things while maintaining a consistent level of empathy or at least the attempt at understanding someone else on a human level is really, really inspiring. I don't know you but I'm glad your content and voice exists.
I'm getting to the end of this and I gotta say--this is really well done. You bring up great points that are *universal* not just about internet culture. I'm 31 now and have been involved in my local rave scene for 11 years and a lot of the allegations Dream has can be applied to soooo many powerful figures and their fans. It's truly sickening how often everything you are describing.happens.
as a former HARDCORE dream stan this video is very healing for me. very rough period of my life and its good to hear many people have had a similar situation
Personal favorite part of the video has to be the line graph bit, you hit the nail on the head when talking about how stans treat influencers. Really enjoyed the roast portion as well, I love your writing style. The emotional and personal segments were brilliant too. Like always you knocked it out of the ball park. You're incredibly talented and i'm excited to see you grow. Love ya Ro
i had a friend last year who was a huge dream stan (and underage) and they got his private snapchat and stuff before i met them and they had proof and showed it off to me all the time. I didn’t realize it was weird until this
i think your insight on being locked into a community is so fucking good. thank you for not just attacking and running, thank you for loving on the people who are stuck because of mental health. you never cease to be kind, youre doing great
What scares me the most is that dream still is being supported by these other MCYT creators, and everyone acts like them just not watching dream will solve the issue. All these creators interact and can monetarily support him through putting him in videos, etc. Even the people who claim to care abt the grooming allegations, obviously do not care since they obsess with dream’s friends, who are still friends regardless of the stuff he’s done. They are enabling him, providing him a means of escaping accountability.
i think this video was done really well and i appreciate u putting yourself out there. i just wanted to say that around 29:30 you said that 93% of the survey takers were queer and then went on to talk about how large a portion of dream stans are queer, but 93% of the people who are dream stans and could access the survey are queer. the people who did the survey likely follow you on twitter and are more likely to be queer because they follow you, so 93%, while a large portion, doesn’t necessarily correlate to the portion of dream stans who are queer. it’s whatever but i just thought i’d share idk
Yeah I'd be interested in dropping the link to the poll in a place where it is mainly dream stans and less crossover, even just to get the self identity statistics
I’ve had a mob of people attack me online as well for something i didnt even do, I totally understand the fear. Its like the world is against you and no matter what you say you just add fuel to the fire. You get so much hate and harassment for the littlest things. I don’t think I’ve ever even swore at somebody online negatively unless it was jokingly, i cant imagine how people type death threats and think its ok. Some people might say that you being scared is an overreaction, and they obviously have not been the target of a mob of haters before. Its awful. We support you and frankly this video was amazingly done. I just hope people take time to digest the meaning without instantly hating
rose, yours is one of the single most important voices among the commentary age of youtube. you ask real questions and you do it with the most amazing and open minded approach. i tell my friends who are parents to watch you because their kids get to grow up in a world influenced by you and it is a beautiful thing to witness. i hope you continue to inspire growth in all you do.
Incredible well made video, Ro. I always appreciate your cinematography towards the end. I really resonated with your ending point: "Change isn't the end of the world. Learning isn't apocalyptical. And sometimes, you have to leave a chapter of your life behind to truly accept what happened during it." Learning to let go is one of the most important things any human being can learn.
I'm a year late, but I wanted to thank you for making this video. I appreciate the empathy you put forth towards Dream fans, former or otherwise. As someone who was part of that community at one point, your message resonated with me, and I knew a lot of people who could have used to hear that. I really do hope everyone who was once a Dream fan found community elsewhere, and I hope any victims are given the space and ability to heal.
The only victims of this whole mess were Dream (relentlessly harassed on Twitter and his family swatted and doxxed many times, you get the point) and Jamie (she was harassed after the burner account posted the fake accusations)
It is totally okay to feel scared and anxious when many fandoms, including the Dream community, is full of negativity and hatred for people. Know that you did a really good thing, putting a lot of things people have said and thought into a video. I don’t stan Dream, I used to be a part of the SMP fandom and back when I was in it it seemed so incredible and amazing and supportive, and I’ve met so many people who are still my friends today who were in the fandom. But there’s just too much stress and conflict and idk how to put it into words. But thank you for making this video because I think it speaks for so many people who also feel this way but are too scared to say it. You should be proud of what you’ve done and how much you’ve accomplished. Happy Halloween🎃
i dont know who you are, i dont know if this video will be good, but the intro skit was so fucking good ive subbed, notifs on, liked, commented, it watered my crops, the piano used has been stuck in my head for six years, i cant sleep, started crying
thank you for speaking about this. truly. i'm an ex-dream fan, and after finding out about this situation, immediately me and some other people on tumblr have tried to spread awareness about it. though, we felt like we were yelling into the void, as it's honestly a pretty small corner of tumblr and most of the voices were coming from twitter, voices defending dream. we tried our hardest to keep this situation alive with all the big things happening around it, but eventually most of us grew desperate. we gave up, some moved to new blogs entirely, leaving this shitshow behind. it was honestly really tragic to see how the situation was already being swept under the rug; most of the people whom i follow in the fandom either didnt acknowledge it in the slightest, or made one statement about "staying neutral" (all while still drawing dream fanart and directly supporting him) i myself just gave up on trying to spread anything else on this matter like 2 or 3 days ago. then i stumbled on this video. once again, thank you. and i'm also glad that you didnt just talk about the situation, but also called him out for his irresponsibility with how he handles his platform as a whole, i also loved the survey idea. i've said that i'm an ex fan, but that wasn't until the grooming situation. and as you know, there were tons of controversies beforehand. and when watching this video, i realized that i was either completely unaware of most of the other controversies, or heavily underestimated some of them as i do not have twitter and just take whatever people said on other platforms (for this situation however i did log on to twitter to find proofs). so i'm glad you're also shedding lights on that as well. (on a lighter note, i really really really love the personality you portray! i love the vibe of the video and i adore your jokes! you've just earned a new subscriber!)
the thing that really struck me about the whole dream situation, as someone who used to be a fan for some time but stopped after continuous scandals and the such, was the entire twitter community. it made me sick to see people so adamantly denying and trying to prove wrong the allegations. what made me feel even more sick though, the people that were outwardly cheering that this had come up, cheering over the victim’s pain caused by dream.
Ro, this is so good. I love how you use the behind the camera perspective to humanize and center your own vulnerability. Meeting people with respect for their perspective and validating their feelings is the first part of reaching anyone, and I think you master that. Bless, and good luck
One thing that's really memorable to me is when Dream quote tweeted someone on Twitter who very mildly criticized him. He has a huge following and should've known better, and at this point it was common knowledge how his fans react. It was like he was using his power just to be petty. The person he quote tweeted was 16 if I remember correctly. They had been blackmailed because someone found their address. Tons of harassment etc. Another similar situation(s) had happened before so it's not like Dream was unaware this would happen. His response to the previous situation(s) was basically just "well, I can't control my fans." No apology, not a single "hey, don't dox people." He put the blame off himself completely instead of doing the bare minimum of telling his fans to not put people's livelihoods at risk.
didnt he literally say "doxxing doesn't do anything" in response to the situation? which means not only is he indifferent to the doxxing, he genuinely thinks there's nothing wrong with it.
Several years ago, a friend of mine was one of a few people who came out about a popular content creator widely considered a smol bean using his fans as an inappropriate dating pool. He got fired from his (content creation) job & dropped from collaborative projects. Now, it’s not considered a big deal because everyone was technically legal, & his new fans are the “and? triggered?” type. My friend had recently turned 18 & he was in his mid or late 20s, not to mention he was really popular at the time (& got popular again now, just in a completely different circle) & she was like, a random girl with 200 twitter followers, many of whom thought he was the best thing since sliced bread. I don’t know a lot about Dream or the allegations, but a lot of the stuff I have seen in passing reminds me of what she went through.
I used to be a big fan but I’ve become really disillusioned. Looking at that twitlonger he put out felt gross. Even if the claims aren’t true, the way it was worded feels so icky??? Idk
i was groomed by someone 3 years older than me, and he genuinely fucked up my life. there is definitely a power dynamic. i was 12 when it began, and he was 16 when i met him (3 years and 7 months.) if you are 18, you are not 100% mature. theres no way. both minors, but theres a power dynamic. both legally adults, BUT THERE IS A POWER DYNAMIC. we shouldnt have to say this, it should be recognized to begin with.
27:55 The main evidence of the manatreed situation was actually never disproven and still holds true. A lot of people just decided that it was fake and made up reasons to justify their perspective, eventually becoming the surviving opinion.
i’m here like a month late, after seeing this in my youtube recommended for ages because as an ex dream stan, even though i do not in any way support him anymore, i still kinda have that same fear of people outside of the community speaking on this kind of stuff as i did when i was in the fandom, to the point where i have around 60 muted words on twitter relating to dream and the dsmp as a whole, because i’m on a different side of twitter now where most people heavily dislike dream and will interact with negative content about him frequently (i remember the day of the face reveal i had to mute every term ppl used to call him ugly and he was still all over my tl) it feels a little hyperbolic to call the dream fandom cult-ish, but i was so hyperfixated for like a year, dream was honestly what my emotional state depended on for a while and i couldn’t even see how weird that was when i was in it. i was very active on twitter during the time, and it was so normalised there - parasocial relationships were a joke in the way everyone was vaguely self-aware enough to know that’s what was happening but not aware enough to see it as wrong. every controversy had evidence refuting it (no matter how weak the evidence was), expose threads were debunked and detailed defences were made, and the people who were ‘antis’ were so aggressive that it pushed everyone even further into their echo chambers. i wasn’t even willing to look at the other side because of the things these same people had done to my mutuals, and to dream himself (i still think the fact people were posting face leaks and his supposed address was weird to say the least). when you’re so parasocially attached to a creator that you will take any excuse to not hear the other side - the mass harassment was just the final nail in the coffin. i’ve experienced this community firsthand. i know just how it sucks you in and makes you believe you’re right and the rest of the internet hates you for an ‘undeserved’ reason. and honestly, i have some sympathy for those who are defending him now, because i couldn’t say i wouldn’t be doing the same thing if i hadn’t left the fandom. it’s horrible, and i hate the fact i can see myself in that position, because id never want to defend a groomer. but even now, there’s some part of me that wants it to be false because the idea of someone i’ve invested so much time and money and emotional attachment into could be such a horrible person is sickening, and this parasocial attachment still lingers on even when i purposefully try to detach myself from it. i can only imagine what it would be like for people who were still fans when the allegations dropped. when you’re desperate to be right about someone, you’ll take any evidence - no matter how flimsy - that disproves the opposition, so you don’t have to detach yourself. anyways sorry for the essay that i doubt anyone will read, but i wanted to share my thoughts as someone who was very active in the community if you got this far thank you for reading haha
54:25 I didn’t expect a whole-hearted, earnest, empathetic response. I’m not a part of the mcyt fandom but your words of kindness and the sentiment of ‘not being determined for pain’ brought me to tears. This is a wonderful, well made and excellently executed video. Thank you for including the intermissions to discuss how you were feeling. It was very honest and real. ❤
I'm not even a dream fan/stan/whatever but I connected HARD with that ending monologue. I'm sure a lot of people, especially queer individuals, relate to that feeling and that fear. Particularly for me it's the "made me worse" thing. Certain circles of friends are fine with toxicity, encourage it because it's "funny." But after a while it wears on a person, it wore on me and I would get angry because they were all just being mean and yelling at each other and when I pointed it out they just sat there blankly like "what do you expect?" But you're absolutely right. It is not predestined that we fall into these friend groups over and over. And the one I'm in right now is supportive and uplifting and even chose to support me when someone from the previous friend group complained and made a "them or me" ultimatum. I would never ask that of them, but it spoke volumes to how they value me and see me for who I am that I had them stand by me. Sorry to like...mildly trauma dump, but you made me cry a little. It just hit harder than I expected a video about a minecraft streamer to hit. You're too good at your job there, Ro.
I think the worst stans have to be swifties. I pray for anyone that says anything less than praise for her and her work. But honestly, stans of anyone can get weirdly feral. Parasocial relationships are something I think has only heightened with online creators (although I know it's always existed) and I'm not sure what solutions there could be to so many young people becoming personally attached to creators.
I was a little nervous to click this video, because I hate drama vids, and am invested in the mine craft fandom. But I really loved your thoughtful look at the culture. I think you really got it. It helped me process it all
Go to expressvpn.com/ro and find out how you can get 3 months of ExpressVPN free!
slay
“I will always believe survivors” I see what you did there. Chefs kiss. Thank you.
Survivor not a victim of.
Hello,
Been watching videos of yours every once in a while. Love the content, mess with you heavy. When I reference you in conversation with friends, what pronouns should I use?
My bad checked your channel description :)
@lemonssssssss4 You can adjust playback speed (faster or slower) by clicking the gear in the top-right corner.
As a Latina who mainly watches Quackity, I can DEFINITELY attest to the racism in MCYT spaces. He got so much nastiness in his chat the first time he did a Spanish stream, and he's constantly portrayed in fanworks as either hyper-aggressive, hyper-sexualized, or nothing but comic relief. He had to call people out on stream once for spamming "El Chapo." It was... upsetting, to say the least.
PLEASE IM SO GLAD SOMEONE'S MENTIONED THIS-- it doesn't help either that quackity (unintentionally, which makes it even sadder) fed the flames with the whole "Mexican dream" bit and other jokes similar to that. I'm not saying it's his fault, as I and many other latinos make similar jokes, but when presented to an audience and space that is mostly white, it encourages them to start making the same jokes as well and they slowly turn from jokes laughing with you to laughing AT you.
Oh god i had no idea people were treatig Quackity like this, what the hell?? I watched some of his older content a long time ago and he seemed like the most wholesome guy ever, really funny too. He deserves so much better.
As a fellow Mexican, I also completely agree; hell, I made a WHOLE discussion and mini essay about the racism in communities like that. The way Spanish speakers and Quackity had to deal with people saying "I don't speak Taco Bell", people asking him for "las drogas", and hell, even the time he was with his friends back in Mexico and they were doing gritos and playing mariachi music, people were telling them to "stop barking" in chat.
There is just nastiness in almost every corner of the MCYT community if you search hard enough. This is honestly why I don't engage anymore.
@@aloofm33rkat28 you should seriously not use the internet anymore if you can’t take a joke, everybody gets made fun of and they literally always make equivalent British jokes, get a grip man you live in a social media bubble
Bro everything that happened with quackity in the fandom makes me genuinely sick
Wait...Billy Eilish stans harassed you over your body? Billy Eilish stans...whose idol has famously been subject to body-shaming internet harassment and suffered greatly for it? Pro-level cognitive dissonance on their part. So sorry that happened to you.
that’s exactly what i was thinking about! im not even a massive billie fan but she would Not approve that shit i know that much
Its hypocrisy not cognitve dissonance in this case, sorry for being an annoying nerd.
@@saumyavig8964 "annoying nerd" the word you're looking for is pedant. (/j ❤️)
Billy Eilish got body shamed??!? I haven't been a fan of hers but her body is pretty attractive? Like not to me but she doesn't look bad at all
@@Ervangelical People can be very petty.
Missed opportunity to have your face at 3/4 angle for the entire video
LMAO IM DYING 😭😭😭😭
thats a very SMART ogre comment💀
LMAOO
oh hey is that micheal in ur pfp!!!????
LMFAOOO
Recently, a tiktoker I really enjoyed got exposed for groping minors while in cosplay. Never once was my reaction "Oh no, I'm losing my favorite creator," it was always, "Oh my god, I trusted this person, I can't believe they would ever do something like that." Not ONCE did I ever defend them or not believe the victims. Dream stans need to learn how to be empathetic and stop thinking about themselves
Pigeonscribble? The victim said they were a groomer too and used a mcdonalds toy as a sex toy
@@booish1846 Yeah them
@@booish1846 jesus that’s so terrible 😭
or dream cuz dream is the fly bussing around their empty heads
honestly, whether or not dream is innocent of recent allegations i truly do hope this current situation serves as a wake up call for his fanbase to not be so stuck on defending a guy they ultimately truly don’t know on a personal level…
yea it’s definitely put in prospective (for me) that i really done know him as much as it seemed i did. it made me take a massive step back and start taking things as if i wasnt a fan and had saw everything going on.
Thats what freaked me out about the Dream fandom, they were so intensely parasocial and it was weird that Dream kinda fed into that instead of going through with “I don’t know you, you’re not my friend boundary.”
I 100% believe he did it. He’s manipulating his young fan base and its wrong to just blame all the child fans for being para social when he literally uses textbook gaslighting and bullying tactics to isolate mentally ill chronically online children
Haven't watched the video yet but yes, very much yes
As someone who watches the community, the worst part is that it hasn’t and it probably won’t be. Rather, it seems to have been a rallying call for a lot of them, strengthening the “us against the rest of the world” mentality a lot of stans have with him. It’s frustrating to watch.
I'm now realizing that once I'm a parent the "parasocial relationships talk" should be included amongst all the other "talks" parents give their kids. When I was younger I was repeatedly warned about talking to strangers online, but influencer culture really tricks younger audiences into thinking they fully know the influencer. It removes the idea that the influencer is still a stranger, not their friend.
No matter how often someone streams or posts or how happy and amazing they look online to thousands/millions of followers, you don't what happens behind closed doors and you do not have a real two-sided relationship with them. That could be so hurtful to a kid (or adult) who is lonely, but it is so important to know.
This is a really good point. It feels like the talk about internet safety stopped with the concept of predators posing as teens in chat rooms so they could lure kids.
for sure! now we need to make sure that when we warn our kids about how adults should and shouldn’t be interacting with them that includes online celebs and influencers. like we need to tell our kids that straight up it is inappropriate for a youtuber to add them on snapchat or compliment them on their appearance
it scares me that adults don’t know enough about the internet to be adequately protecting their kids. like the children at my middle school shouldn’t have been on omegle or messaging random old men on kik but no one’s parents even knew what those things were
As a lonely teenager I had a serious parasocial relationship with the Achievement Hunter team (mostly their let's plays crew).
And that was mostly a positive experience for me, but there were times it did negatively effect me, times where they made a misogynistic comment and then the comments exploded and it became so apparent that as a teenage girl I wasn't really welcome in that space. And with hindsight it's easy to see what could have happened to me had I ever gone deeper and tried to make contact. It *did* happen to some of the teenage girls who did that.
It probably helps to frame it as a kind of fictional realtionship. You like the persona they play, not the real person that are. Then it's no more dangerous than a parasocial relationship with Luke Skywalker or Katniss Everdeen.
@@kristen7687 do kids even still use Kik. I thought they'd all gone to telegram these days.
As someone who actually enjoyed his content back in 2020 - Dream has consistently demonstrated he has an atrocious temperament. He reacts extremely poorly and aggressively to any perceived slight, which emotionally stirs up his fans and makes them feel even more loyal to him as ‘defenders’.
Regardless of the truth to these allegations, Dream is an unstable and arrogant creator, making him a wildly irresponsible role model for a younger audience.
Makes sense.
How he cheated for clout and denied it. It shows who he is.
agree
his nasty temperament affects a lot of the things he does. whenever he felt attacked or salty about mcc (minecraft championships) he would on occasion start making jabs at whatever other streamer he thought had done something unfair on stream. he’s competitive to the point of toxicity. when i was still into mcyt, the mcc hype was huge. every once in a while, clips of him acting immature and butthurt would get reposted across social media, and even though i never watched dream and his main friend group, these clips brought down the vibe of everybody involved with mcc- fans, staff, and other streamers. its very minor but i just remembered it and think it’s an interesting point. it happened no more than a couple times. but those couple times, the clips i saw were so bitter, he made subtle jokes with his friends on stream in a way that suggested they had ragged on their less-popular minecraft youtubers for a hours in discord calls. so bitter. over a regular monthly minecraft tournament hes always gonna be in, because he has millions of subscribers. nuts
I absolutely noticed this too!! I was into the dream SMP in 2020, but i never really liked dream himself. He always struck me as weirdly defensive and tempermental.
facts
When you turn 18 you’re not automatically an adult. You don’t all of a sudden absorb a mature mentality when the clock strikes 12. These are still very young very impressionable people. I’m so sick of the “she may be in high school but she’s 18”. SHES IN HIGH SCHOOL.
Exactly!!! I get so sick when I see guys in their thirties date 18 year olds and claim its okay because they are "very mature" and an "adult". I unfortunately see it quite often.
Yeah! Like I'm only 20 going on 21 but I'm still super careful about the interactions I have online with 16-18-year-olds, even though we're relatively closer in age, I am the one with greater social power in that relationship, and I must be careful and responsible for the sake of both of us.
Gotta love how this mindset is never offered to the guys in any of these situations. "18M, 17F? GROOMER!!!" You people are hypocrites.
@@anitaremenarova6662 it literally is but the majority of people, specifically other men and boys, rather then helping these young boys either say, “oh if that was me i would’ve been grateful” or just str8 up getting mad at the double standard without helping or truly caring abt those young men at all. although can’t tell if your trolling or not atp
@@-miaumiau Not what I'm talking about. I'm saying that young guys that are legally adult are still just dumb children, not everyone is this groomer mastermind. This courtesy is however never extended to them, very misandrist of all of you.
A good way to gauge how a person really is, is to check their reaction to something that can be _perceived_ as bad - in Dream's case, his victory screech being misconstrued as offensive to Indigenous Americans and his reaction to that misconstruction. Instead of explaining to people that he was referencing Spongebob Squarepants, to which most people's reaction would have been, "Oh, alright." and moving on, for his gut reaction to be a tirade about how he's part Indigenous (Which, hey, he could be - we don't know) tells a lot about his personal character. I mean, most people would just go, "That's just from Spongebob." if the same thing happened to them. I know I would.
THIS!! you just explained perfectly why i got such an icky feeling from his response to criticism
or (in my opinion slightly better and building on that idea) "it was a reference to spongebob, but I can understand why some folks might find it offensive and I will do my best to educate myself on those sorts of issues/avoid it in the future"
most people who suddenly say 'I'm part indigenous though!' as a defense for doing something that offends native Americans is usually sus, not even being able to pick a supposed tribe (Or country! America isn't the only place in the world with indigenous peoples) speaks to his character too imo
i find it odd how the whitest of white men somehow always suddenly claim to have "indigenous" in them the second theyre exposed for being racist... like ... alright kyle... 🧐
@@sora1498 I mean I do find it shocking just _how_ white he is. Like, I'm someone who's about as pale as a full bottle of Elmer's glue, and I think Dream has me beat on lack-of-pigment in our skin.
As a former dream stan I found that a lot of anti-semitism (I am not Jewish so I can’t claim to understand antisemitism) and white supremacy was rampant throughout the community the main reason I left. I remember constantly feeling bad for being a POC and when interacting with other POC individuals they too also pushed down their identities and idolising individuals because they were white. People talking about how only white people were attractive just a lot of insecurity and internalised racism. There was always this push of being progressive and POC friendly but again it was all performative no one actually cared and actually caring was defined as retweeting and liking a thread. I fell into a really deep self hatred hole because of how much I felt ashamed of my own ethnicity.
I'm Jewish and used to watch dream. you're absolutely right about the antisemitism and white supremacy in the community
I think the fact that it is a comfort/safe place for people (a lot of them white) is a double edged sword in this regard. It doesn’t foster the environment for the hard (and oftentimes political) conversations around modern racism.
It’s a hard pill to swallow. Being the ignorant and complaint majority of an oppressive system. Especially when many seeking out comfort due to struggles associated similarly unjust systems of a different cause.
mind you to this day theres still no woc in the dsmp
@@xEEEa7iu231 tinakitten and shes the only one :(
It's always been so weird to me how that community treats Quackity
As a former lonely teen who used the internet as comfort, I appreciatte the compassionate tone of this video and the questions you raise.
We aren't taught that we can love something and still be critical of it, still see the less-good or bad parts and try to correct them.
Now, more than ever, it's important that we are kind to one another and learn to think with nuance about our world and all of the intersections in it.
Thank you so much Rose, you may be the woman that convinces me to try a really dramatic eyeliner
lovely comment 👏
(try the eyeliner--it might be fun!!)
@@yourbellboy thank you so much! You are so sweet ❤️
(I'm trying to find an excuse/occasion)
ro's braver than any us marine, i would rather DIE than take on dream stans
for a thick second I though you were talking about Joe Rogan. Don't ask how... I don't know
Does he still have stans? I saw a bunch of kids on tik tok denouncing him after the face reveal💀
aren't these basically the same thing?
fr shout out ro
@@KickedBackL on twitter his stans were mostly just acting like he looks like a greek god or something
I hate being trans on the internet, and on UA-cam. It's the one thing stopping me from making a channel about living the low-tech life.
You inspire me every day.
I’m not trans but I hope you’re able to do it if it’s a passion of yours. You deserve to start a UA-cam channel just like the rest of us! I’ve had these thoughts just because I’m not conventionally attractive (not comparing the two). The internet can be such a brutal place.
Make it. The people who are plain hateful are the ones who should feel scared and ashamed because their souls are currently garbage.
Go for it; you have my sub!
Do it!
There are also communities you can join for support if you still wanna do it
I feel like it should be noted that a massive creator interacting on a 1-on-1 private impermanant space like snapchat with a fan who met them through being a fan of their work is an inappropriate interaction. There is a hard power dynamic built into that relationship, even if they were both adults. I'd compare it to an inappropriate relationship between a college professor and a student- even though both parties are adults, there is an inherent difference in power between the teacher and the student, even if that person is no longer a student of the professor.
yep there is genuinely just no reason someone would do it unless they want to leverage the admiration the fan feels for them to get something that they would not be comfortable asking for in any other open space. there are too many other ways to interact with your fans if your intentions are above-board that are both more convenient and dont immediately seem sketchy
Well said
exactly, it really reminds me of the callmecarson situation in that aspect (obviously, the details are different, but each controversy was based on the power dynamic), fascinating how such a similar situation has such different responses, and a part of me feels like it has something to do with their appearance (or at least in dream's case, perceived fan appearance). because dream is twitter's golden boy it's like the opposite side of the same coin
@Nightingale V I think the reason why Carson got booted is because the people who exposed him were his former content creator friends (aka Lunch Club, Goop, and for a short period Fart Club). Note the fact that since this allegation came to light, absolutely nobody close to Dream has left him like Lunch Club did to Carson. A massive part of what informs public opinion on these types of situations is how the people closest to the accused react. For example, during the recent situation with Mizkif on Twitch, his streamer org (OTK) had him temporarily removed while they investigated what exactly happened. If OTK had stated the opposite and defended Miz's character, then public opinion would likely be swayed in favor of Mizkif.
I do wonder now about if a fan/ celebrity relationship would ever be a fair dynamic. That’s a really interesting thing to think about, like does that make a celebrity who chooses to date a fan weird 100% of the time.
I was one of the people who filled out the survey. I'm an ex dream stan and I'm really glad you made this video. When I was a stan, the community believed victims. We were open to criticism. But only on a surface level. Most of us couldn't bare being without the content from our cc's, and would move on as soon as we could. But even then, looking at what the minecraft youtuber community is now is just a reflection of how unhealthy I was, but even worse. They have created a hostile, toxic environment full of hypocrites. Back in the day, dream stans used to attack and body shames tons of other creators, but it's only bad now when it happens to Dream, for example. That's just an example of how terrible it is. This video has amazing points about how no one should be afraid to post (as his stans would call it) "dream neg" or even just a video about dream. The community would literally run stans off the platforms if you joked about him CHEATING (in mc, which... he did). Great vid Ro!
Since this is gaining traction I thought I’d write a little more about my personal experiences. I made a lot of friends, and as Ro said the community is a really accepting place for queer people such as myself and during this time I finally labelled my sexuality and gender id. However, I was so so unhealthy. It was during the pandemic and I was barely doing school because I was spending 24/7 devoted to dream and co. I had 4k+ followers on twitter for being a stan. I thought that my attachment was normal. I would donate to them because it meant they would basically acknowledge you. I’m so grateful I left, I was miserable but convinced myself I was fine. The community is a huge echo chamber that validates and glorifies unhealthy behaviors like mine. Just thought I’d share my experience for the hell of it :) Sorry if this is a huge ramble
There is no cheating scandal in ba sing se....
@@aff77141
Kid you not when it came out that he cheated people made almost no noise about it in the community… people did not care. Which, I mean I don’t really care that he cheated still it’s more all of the deflection and disproving he tried to do and leading his fans on with trust in him only to end up a cheater 😭
neg?
@@mikafizz1022
short for negative. people would ask you tag anything discussing or in itself negative about dream as “dream neg.”
i will be honest ive been in the fandom since late 2020 i wasnt really following lore at the time and i didnt really donate to streams or anything but im still in it. i do agree theres a toxic side to the fandom but i dont think its much to the fault of dream... i actually find myself feeling bad for him im around his age and i cant imagine having a fandom that big and no real way to control it. no commonality between these people other than you. hes not a perfect person but i do empathize with that part of his situation a lot.
I’m an ex mcyt fan, Aphmau specifically. I remember slowly fading away from her content as it started to change and then finding out what she had done. The idealization of predatory relationships, the subtle racism, the queer baiting, and more. I’m so embarrassed to tell anyone I used to be obsessed with her content because I know how people react.
I was a kid and she was the only content creator I felt cared for by (being a young, queer, nd, traumatized kid). I was enamoured by the fantasy aspects, and the community; and I can only have empathy for dsmp fans. I know what it’s like to be so attached to a character a creator puts on to the point of obsession.
I want those who are afraid of leaving the fandom to know that you aren’t at fault for attaching yourself to a creator, but it’s your responsibility to realize that these communities don’t actually care for you and your friends.
Damn kinda feel like the reason why i drop her is stupid now i drop her cause literally she didn't choose neither luarence and garroth in her old minecraft diaries
@@AnneYups God I remember that! Her picking Aaron was such a let down! Laurence and Garroth were so much better then Aaron
@@goblinguy3103 she had two perfectly good guys and now she just fallen in love with a strange emo dude
wait what did aphmau do????
@@SaphInfection Aaron was three years older then Aph when they were in high school. She was a freshmen and he was a Senior, which is super illegal. (She was 15, he was 18)
In regards to Queer baiting, there are SO many instances where two guys are put in a queer situation (Think Dante and Aaron kissing on accident, Laurence and Garroth kissing on accident) and then you add in Laurence and Garroth literally living together, being “best friends” and “roommates” (queer calling cards), it’s clear that Jessica only did this to entice a queer audience even though they never actually got together. Plus the only main MLM (man loving man) relationship in Mystreet being with a man just named “Guy” and his unknown boyfriend.
Also, the ONLY queer woman we really see (Katelyn) ending up in a straight relationship. Not saying bi women have to get with other women, but she is quite literally the only not-straight woman I can think of from mystreet and that’s an issue.
There’s also the entire KC being based on super racist Japanese stereotypes (think the “kawaii” school girl”), the normalization of assaulting men (the Pizza Delivery Guy from S1, and just lazy writing (like Travis being Aphs bff in high school but suddenly not remembering her in mystreet)
I hope this video goes over well, you don't deserve any harrassment especially with how you always handle subjects with a lot of empathy and care
Agree fully.
It is genuinely mental to me that Ro is only 21. Wtf?? I wish I had had half the wisdom+ability to articulate my thoughts, holy cow. You are doing so great, hon - always cheering you on :D
Ro's out there out-comedianing and out-insighting 30+ y.o. people and retaining my attention like a Pokemon game, it's marvelous to behold a master wordsmith.
your comment is sweet and i belive you have 100% good intentions but you should know "hon" is a slur trans women call other trans women who don't pass well, just so you know in the future. I would use Hun instead :)
I remember when Taylor Swift got an 8/10 rating on Pitchfork and her fans doxxed the journalist involved. I wish Taylor would've spoken out against this - even if she didn't ask them to, it happened on multiple occassions and she should've condemned that behaviour. Her fans also harassed ex-boyfriends and sent them death threats without a peep from her. I guess the moral of the story is that fans will act like you are a heretic for any criticism against their gods.
her fans definitely engage in cultish behavior and she knows it but would never say anything or try to stop it, she seems to like it that way, considering her fans have "helped" her clean her name when rightfully accused of something
Taylor is against bullying only when it affects her. Her fandom bullies people (her exes, critics) and she never stops it even when her fans overstep their boundaries
@@lhvy5066 accused of what? (genuine)
@@Anonymous-bi5pv I'm totally guessing here but I would assume @ ihvy might be referring to "accusations" (there's a lot of documented proof but we'll put it in quotes) of Taylor dating a 17-18 year old when she was in her early 20s and going as far as to buy a house next to his after they'd only been together for a couple months. He was a Kennedy and she'd also been publicly obsessing over the family for at least a year before she started dating him, and at the time he was her only conceivable "in" to the family which had clearly been a long term goal of hers. It was...... very fucking bizarre to say the least, whether or not he was 18 when they started dating she's like 5 years older than him, which is a large age gap when you're in your late teens-early 20s. Fans have deflected this behavior by claiming that Taylor was just "overcorrecting" after being in relationships with much much older men as a 19-20 year old. And to be fair John Mayer was very weird/focused on her while she was still a teenager/barely legal before they started dating, and I don't want to deligitimize her experiences in that situation because it was not appropriate or okay in the slightest, but that doesn't like.... magically make her behavior better, either. Both can be fucked up at the same time. And if OP wasn't referring to that, then several of her 1989 era music videos were accused of being racist (specifically anti-black, in the form of cultural appropriation and glamorizing the colonial period) which was highly documented and people have discussed it better than me. Her fans also have excuses for those videos because of course. And if it isn't THAT I don't even know, maybe the private plane thing lmao
I'm a swift fan for her music and... Yeah. This is 100% true. Obviously there's been false accusations (kimye 💀 or Demi being like 'Tay doesn't support Britney' when Taylor had actually donated money to her legal team for years) and her name did get dragged through the mud in 2016 but that doesn't mean that there's no room for legitimate criticism.
Tbf lots of swifties I followed on twitter condemned the private jet use, and the fans doing the dogpiling are in the 0.1%, but its still unacceptable.
Edit: Also Taylor seems to have withdrawn from all socials apart from tiktok, but she should still be aware of the behaviour of her twitter fans, cos ignoring what they do in your name isn't a strategy
When a creator/celebrity has a second Snapchat account that they add fans on it’s a red flag immediately
I will never forget when I saw clips of Dream going on a stream and saying doxxing “wasn’t that bad”. As if it’s not an actual crime. As if it’s not still actively putting someone’s life in danger. Tbh if this isn’t him trying to send hints of encouragement to doxx, idk what is
Is dream’s dox out there?
Dream said that out of personal experience, and he said doxxing is bad IN THE SAME STREAM. He said it’s rare to have people come over to your house if you get doxxed.
@@lobruh9039 i get that, but he's minimizing the issue, still.
oh man, this made me think a LOT about the ways that autistic people specifically are mocked for the way we discuss our interests. I've been thinking abt it recently -- being someone with incredibly strong interests in things, particularly ones deemed "immature", means you're ostracized and thought of as weird. obv special interests can be around someone really nasty, or can consume your life to a point that's no longer healthy, but even healthy and normative ways that autistic ppl express our affection for something is demeaned by greater society. even other neurodivergent ppl tend to turn on autistic ppl when we discuss the ways we are specifically looked down upon. also, for whatever reason, a lot of fringe interests (being a furry comes to mind) are dominated by autistic ppl, and as a result a lot of the bullying and abuse they face intersects w/ autistm-specific ableism. I haven't thought abt this enough to make it a greater point but it's something that I'm so regularly upset about.
It can be very hard for autistic people to hear criticisms of things we like, b/c those interests are so core to ourselves and b/c we're oftentimes mocked for them, so I particularly understand why someone might want to avoid criticisms of things they like. hell, I have special interests in shows I know are bad writing-wise (and have some uhhhhh Problematic episodes) and seeing ppl talk about why they don't particularly like it hurts.
I hope all the autistic Dream stans can get more healthy, less parasocial special interests. I feel very lucky as someone on the spectrum that, while I've had some weird phases, I've been able to mostly stay in the realm of what I consider healthy interests for myself. obv the "getting personally offended when someone says they don't like a pretty mid-tier show" is nnnot great, but y'know, I'm working on it. Also please find someone to stan who doesn't hate us and minimize our experiences, that would be great
Mine is Antartica, the time I jad an argument about it was my family being sure it was not a continent. And talking like I was dumb because they're 5 to think that and I'm alone.
yeah, as a current hermitcraft/empires fan and former dream smp fan, a lot of dream fans can be unnecessarily toxic. the hermitcraft/empires smp fandom is imo a lot more safe and accepting especially for people of color and disabled people, and the ccs are much better at interacting with their fanbase and even the hardcore stans (which are few and far between) aren’t half as intense as dream stans. i can’t speak to other people’s experiences but i was only in the dream smp fandom for a little while before i discovered that dream stans exist, and that very quickly made me officially decide that that fandom wasn’t going to be a safe space for me. i was far removed from the dream smp fandom when the allegations came out, so it didn’t really affect me much. however i did see a couple of my tumblr mutuals who were somewhat engaged in the dream smp, and who belived the victim, and they got it pretty hard from the toxic dream stans. a lot of them decided to leave the dream smp fandom permanently, and one even disavowed mcyt altogether. i haven’t said anything about it on tumblr except reblog a few posts because i don’t want the dream fans to attack me. i know how the dream stans can be, and you’re really brave for talking about it ro.
I can second the experience with hermitcraft, I wrote a long comment and had to restart but creators like xisuma, falsesymmetry mumbojumbo and others all struck me as very responsible and emotionally mature, at least when I was watching minecraft content- and trust me, that might genuinely equate to an entire year of my life in watchtime over like a 7 year period and I’m probably not the only one. Mindcrack was another one, kurtjmac, aureylian, omgchad, ethoslab, zisteau etc. Point is that although there is a lot of mind-numbing, hyperactive minecraft content on youtube that’s rather shamelessly exploiting the short attention spans of kids and certain symptoms of neurodivergence, profiting on v-bucks scam equivalents, creators being creepy or straight up grooming, etc, at least from my experience there were always very open, accepting, and mature communities that usually felt comfortable for me, although I admit most communities would be for someone like me. I think regardless of whether he deserves the title or not, Dream seems to be very much a figurehead of that hyperactive groomer interpretation of mcyt, even if someone like me (who was really turned off by that side of youtube and even moreso now that I’m older) doesn’t believe that that image fairly describes the majority of minecraft youtube creators.
i am also more of an empires/hermitcraft fan, and i don't really watch dream smp content (or content from most people on the server). it always kind of rubbed me the wrong way. i prefer the nostalgic and far more accepting communities of minecraft, and there are so many creators that are really great. sometimes it sucks though when minecraft creators you like still support/interact with dream and others (like actively try to, i get your in the same area if a creator happens to be in a large vc and hes in thats kinda whatever to me). anyways dream stans are so scary, and i hate the way he doesn't even make an attempt to stop them.
also that thread ro linked has really changed my view on a lot of creators i thought were alright.
I actually recently got into hermitcraft and empires after watching the life series and I would have to say it does seem better. For one, a lot of the creators are older and more established in their careers which I think helps them deal with the negative effects of having a fandom, and although I think there are negative aspects to the community they seem to have an overall positive relationship with it. Also, any problematic things they've said or done seem to be things from the past that have been apologized for and views that have changed, but even then the ones that have these issues at all seem to be few and far between. I do think it sucks that the dsmp has gotten so big that creators who have been around for far longer have had their careers and fanbases defined by others based on something out of their control, but the popularity of the dsmp has also helped overall mcyt so it's probably mostly positive for them. I think there are still problems with this kind of parasocial behavior in all of these communities, but I don't think that's necessarily the creators faults and may in part come from this sort of new culture we've had with mcyt and overall fandom for a while now, as well as just like. Human nature which we can't really change but we can try to recognize and manage
I do have empathy for certain dream stans though. I get very strong hyper fixations and though I try to engage in a more healthy way, seeing criticism of something I love can hurt and make me feel like I'm bad for ever loving it... And that's talking about things like seeing criticism for Steven Universe and the Magnus Archives, something where I recognize that I really shouldn't feel like that. So I can't imagine how something like this feels for some of these people
An interesting note about this! I feel like the reactions people had in the DSMP fandom to the allegations had a lot to do with what specific cc’s you follow. I was and am a kinda casual fan when compared to some people in the fandom, but I was still pretty active when everything went down, so I saw some shit.
But, the thing is, I’m an SBI fan. I didn’t really interact with many Dream Stan’s.
I saw lots of people disown him, I saw a lot of people saying to believe the victims, and even a lot of people removing his character from fics and comics or just said they’d always portray him as a villian. Lots of “if you support Dream, get out” kinda shit.
This doesn’t really add anything, but I hope it might bring you a little more peace regarding the fandoms reaction to this specific event; A lot of people were great about it. That being said, I’m very sorry that there were so many assholes that fucked with you; it may be a hollow apology, but it’s a problem you should never have had to deal with. Shits fucked.I hope that you’re happy over in hermitcraft/empires :) I hope it’s less stressful, has less racists, and that you have fun! The fanart looks sick ;)
If you made a compilation of all the rapid diss segments you've ever done, that would be a killer video. Those are so funny.
You know the basic life tips we're all taught as children, stuff like stranger danger, don't do drugs etc? We should add "celebrities are not your friends" to that.
honestly!! especially now, since literally anyone can become a celebrity online
Ludwig had the right idea all along
I’m glad you made this video even if it might cause backlash from Dream fans. I think this is something important to talk about. We can’t just blindly defend creators, and it’s really upsetting that people build parasocial relationships with their fans that are so strong that they could do almost anything and “get away with it” so to speak. I think it’s important we talk about why that’s wrong.
as a "Real Victim" whenever a random abuser weaponizes the hypothetical idea of me against another victim im legally required to kill another hostage
you're gonna run out of hostages atp 😭
@@pissboy2 worst profile picture ive ever seen
@@peenyweeny3834 thanks beastie 🥰
Same, we ride at midnight
for context I’m a queer, indigenous, person who falls under the trans umbrella, I also have autism and ADHD
I used to be in the Dream SMP fandom [~July 2020 - September 2021] however I wasn’t into Dream and I’ve gotta say, this was the worst fandom experience I’ve ever had, even during my time in the Dream SMP community, I never liked him [I was more into Wilbur Soot and Fundy] and at some point I mentioned my dislike for him after the indigenous war cry incident and how he handled it, I did this on Twitter, what does Twitter do? dogplie, what happened to me? I got dogpiled. I was spammed gore, death threats, doxxing threats, people threatened my reptiles, called me slurs and so much more. overtime near the end of my hyperfixation I drew fanart for the Dream SMP less and less and began drawing more of my new hyperfixation, and got backlash for that! it was pure insanity, I have many other stories, but I thought I’d talk about that one in particular, since it stuck with me a lot, I’m mostly desensitized to gore but it shocked me with how fine people were with sending me it, I feel so bad for people who are still in the community, I do hope they leave, it can be hard if it’s a hyperfixation but it improved my mental health so much and I hope things go well for those who are leaving/recently left the fandom, same goes for those who left the fandom awhile ago
[very sorry for weird English, it’s my second language, it’s 4 AM and UA-cam mobile sucks]
Holy hell I'm so sorry you went through that, what a vile way to treat someone. It's insane how comfortable people are with switching into full-on, unironic villain behavior when they think theyre "defending" someone (who is not only objectively in the wrong but also doesn't know they exist and doesnt give 2 shits about them.)
omg how dare you, an indigenous POC, have an opinion on a racist thing he did /sar
jokes aside, that was really shitty and im so sorry that happened to you!!
Seeing this happen to people is one of the reasons I left twitter
I feel like despite the satire this comment section is actually talking about this in a somewhat mature manner rather than just “dream fan bad. Dream fan die” a lot of dream fans are just misguided kids, and not everyone who likes the dream smp actually likes dream. After seeing the way he handled his conflicts I couldn’t really find it in me to respect him and I had been a dream smp fan for over a year. I still like the smp story at least for the earlier days and I still like the dynamics between Wilbur and his friends and enjoy “bench trio / sbi” side of the smp but I’ve kinda grown past it
I never really liked Dream, only ever got into the dsmp thanks to Techno and now that he's gone I drifted away from all of it.
@@anitaremenarova6662 I got into it bc of an animatic I saw for the mind electric and I was curious about what the animatic meant so I watched wilburs playlist and it was super cool and fun but I never really cared much about dream
imo, no creator at dream's size should EVER talk like that with fans, platonically or romantically. no matter what, there is going to be an inevitable power dynamic that just cant be avoided and it is no good for ANYONE. dream is constantly irresponsible with his fans and enables their horrific behaviour which is why i can never, EVER feel sympathy or believe him.
But like, what do you do then? Are you just never allowed to meet anyone ever?
@@guyferrari8124 not everyone is a dream fan. Most people aren’t.
I dont know if you know him but another UA-cam creator called philza sometimes gives advice to new streamers or people of that kind and he does that knowing his platform and their dynamic and I think that that is the only way to engage 1 on 1 with fans
ro, you are the most eloquent, beautiful and audacious (in a good way obv) creator on youtube. i love watching your videos and hearing your takes. standing up against dream stans can’t be easy. you go, girl 🖤
Yes!! Love when I see that Ro video notification 🫶
This is such a sweet comment. You seem like a really lovely person, and furthermore, I agree fully. ❤
I agree! every single video entertains and impresses me. one of my favorite UA-camrs ever
I will say, a lot of people forget about Anastasia, who was the first person to come out with her story. This is because she's been completely inactive on Twitter. She privated her account because she was receiving mass harassment and death threats. Amanda hasn't been active, but she is getting legal help so it makes sense. So many people harassed her snd her account is still public. I really do hope those two are alright.
And Manatreed situation wasn’t even false 💀 most of the older fans understand and know that it’s true but that Dream couldn’t confirm it without doxing himself. Younger fans to this day believe Manatreed was innocent, and exactly the same kind of separation happened with the recent allegations too :\
And the face reveal basically confirmed it was real, but again his fanbase will just ignore it because dream said it's fake
Regardless of whether the allegations are true or not, the way that people were so quick to harass the victims + try to rip their stories apart for some popular UA-cam guy they barely know is really upsetting, especially considering that they'd ruin other creators they're less attached to for more "mundane" reasons.
As an autistic person who hyperfixates on creators I like, I believe there's a very fine line between simply hyperfixating and being dependent on someone for ALL of your happiness. It frustrates me seeing just how wrapped around his finger Dream's fanbase seem to be + the lack of attempt from Dream to properly establish boundaries that will reduce harm is also not great. I know there are many fans/ex-fans who just want to see Dream improve and will keep giving him the benefit of the doubt because they're so used to investing time and effort into someone who couldn't possibly return it no matter how many "I love yous" he says.
I am so happy that you made this video. I hope that the situation will open some people's eyes and they'll realize just how absorbed in their more-than-parasocial bubble they have become.
I agree so much with your first point!!! he lacks tact and even if by some miracle the allegations are false (which he quite literally admitted that they weren’t) his response was highly telling of his character.
his response to controversies in general has always been similar in that he doesn’t truly admit to wrongdoings, and the “hes young and can’t manage such quick rise to fame” excuse can only get you so far. at some point you have to take responsibility, and even comparing other white boy minecrafters handling their controversies, they manage to hold some tact and at least make a formal apology. its just wild to me that one of the biggest faces in the scene is also one of the most irresponsible and tactless especially with his fanbase, like you said
I think it's pretty fair considering there have been many blatantly false accusations thrown against other members of the dsmp before.
@@anitaremenarova6662 and
@@lhvy5066 You shouldn't believe everything on the internet. Your parents should've really taught you that.
"try to rip their stories apart"...you mean proving them false? Because falsely accusing someone of something as serious as grooming can ruin not only their reputation, but their LIFE, AND IS A HORRIBLE THING TO DO??
I really empathize with these fans because I used to have a huge parasocial relationship with One Direction back in the day - I was deeply unhappy with my environment in real life so I felt I had to form an attachment with five random dudes. I noticed focusing on what made me happy in real life and finding fulfillment there brought me out of this submersion in stan culture. However, it took me a lot of time to get there, and I noticed I'll slip back into parasocial attachment if I'm particularly struggling mentally - fortunately, it's at most a tiny fraction of what it used to be.
Thank you for another beautifully empathetic and nuanced video Ro :)
Well done on getting out of that mentality, I can imagine how hoard it must have been when your happiness is dependent on celebrities, especially when the fan base is quite dependent on each other.
I will say that I'd love to see a dissection on the whole fan x 1D parasocial relationship and the nuances with how 1D were hated cos the forefront of their fan base were mostly teenage girls as well as how it came to be like that.
You really have a wonderful way with words, Ro. Sometimes it almost sounds more like you’re reciting poetry than a commentary piece. The way you deliver things feels so powerful yet it doesn’t get too pretentious.
i was a dream stan for about 2 years, I'm a queer poc so when I first joined the fandom I felt like it was one of the most accepting communities I had ever been a part of (mind you I was 17 and going through a cluster fuck of identity crises). but as time went on I found that the deeper you went into the community, the more it showed its true colors. racism, transphobia, antisemitism, it was like a little cocktail of how far people were willing to go to defend a man they ultimately didn't know. last yeamucr dream said something about getting a thrill out of quote-retweeting people that openly criticized him on twitter that was terrifying, and it pushed me to leave the community. I loved dream and his content, and I wish I could said I had a clean slate when I left the community, but the truth is that I was an angry stan too, I got very defensive over anything mildly negative related to dream and I refused to see anything beyond what I was conditioned to think by the creator and the community. I can say these things in retrospect but ofc back then I thought that it was normal and healthy, and I was just having fun. but I really do hope people, stans, start understanding that criticism isn't hate.
37:00 it almost seems like with these fandoms theres a sunk* cost fallacy. They received so much hate for being in the community that the community and creator has to be worth it
Edit:typo
im not sure if its a typo and im truly not trying to be rude, its the sunk cost fallacy. named so bc it references the amount time/money/effort that people dedicate or 'sink' into something. i really think you are on to something here. ro makes a good point about people wanting to keep being able to consume things that comfort them, but i do think there are some people who react from a place where they're so invested they dont feel like they can divest themselves from it, for a multitude of reasons
@@cassinipanini yeah thanks It was a typo😅
As an ex mcyt and dream fan people inside and outside of the fandom NEED to look at the way these creators talk about accountability. So much of the allegations or offensive clips that are brought up against the creators are dismissed by the fandom for trying to get them "cancelled" and the reason this response is so common is because of the mcyt creators! Their language and tone when addressing criticism and allegations is downright manipulative to a certain degree. Accountability is thrown to the wind when they tell their fans the people who believed the victims are "gullible" and "band wagoners", even going so far as to say the victims making accusations are "clout chasers" who want attention. I honestly have more empathy for the fandom because of this rhetoric that is constantly fed to them by not just the creators, but their own fans. UA-cam accounts dedicated to dismissing allegations made against these creators with hundreds of thousands of subscribers and stans constantly talking about how sweet and kind their favorite creator is and how they couldn't possibly have done something wrong all add up to a toxic and unhealthy response to criticism and allegations. If you are reading this and are part of the mcyt and dream fandom please PLEASE watch this video in its entirety with an open mind, and think critically when others in your fandom are dismissing issues being brought up.
I’d agree but jschlatt is a shit person who’s been outed numerous times for saying some problematic shit
jschlatt is so based
@@silverdrag0n_ did you read the comment or are you an upset dream stan
@@jinxhex do you think a dream stan would call jschlatt based?
@@silverdrag0n_ I said that his comment was an example of the PROBLEM, I'm not a jschlatt fan and I was using his quote as an example of UA-camrs language when addressing allegations and such.
if the allegations are true or not, it doesnt matter. the way that dreams stans reacted to the victim coming forward, completley tearing them apart shows that they are not supportive to victims. if this turns oit to be true or not to be true, if this happens again (or happens for the first time) then the victim is way less likely to come forward after seeing how they responded. most dream stans scare me because they are just so ride or die for some dude on the internet that they do not even know
Believe victims, not accusers
@@guyferrari8124 how do you know if someone is a victim or an accuser until it is unequivocally proven that something did or did not happen?
@@theboondoggliest That saying is more for people who come out of the woodwork with a massive twitter thread alleging they’ve been groomed. You have to do an investigation on that kind of thing because there have been way too many times where the allegations where proven false.
@@guyferrari8124 idk if im just not understanding what your saying but in every grooming or SA situation there has to be an investigation, not believing or supporting a victim even when you dont have all the details perpetuates the mindset that SA and grooming survivors arent telling the truth, and lead to people who have gone through this with no support (which is something that happens extremely often, speaking from experience). Im not saying that people who DO lie about stuff like this are good people, theyre not, they damage peoples belief in actual victims, but the number of false allegations are extremly small in comparison go true allegations.
So yes, believe the victim
@@theboondoggliest Listen, I’ve been in the twitter dramasphere through a few fandoms and I will tell you there has been enough times where somebody tries to get someone thrown to the twitter dogs for false grooming allegations for reasons that can range from monetary to petty to personal gain that you can’t take anything at face value. This goes for both sides as well, as you can’t immediately believe someone once they put out a defense. Serious claims like these need to be taken with nuance because they can ruin lives. (Not saying that’s what’s happening with dream, I’m talking in general)
to me, Dream looks like a local community college cafeteria lurker. like he’s just always there playing dnd or playing a gameboy idk I’m pretty stoned and this is my truth
speak your truth youtube user 🖤alexa
One of the biggest problems I have with Dream is how he manipulates his very big, young and impressionable audience, by feeding into this unhealthy parasocial narrative that helps cultivate some absolutely outrageous behavior, like harrassment, doxxing, etc.
I'm not saying Dream is responsible for the unsaviory actions of every single stan made on his behalf, but due to the size and age-range of his fanbase, he does carry a great responsibility for how he interacts with them. A responsibility which he doesn't seem to care about, based on how little he actually acknowledges these very serious things his fans has done, even making fun of others for caring about it.
In short, Dream reads to me as the type of guy that believes he's above others, and likes manipulating people into thinking the same without facing the consequences (just look at the Minecraft speedrun fiasco, for instance). Sorry for the rant, but I just had to get it out there, u know?
I don't have anything to really to add to the discussion. Just that when you ended the video with "I hope your life gets better", I audibly said "Thanks Ro. I hope yours does too." Sometimes when your life is absolute shit, you just need a complete stranger wishing you well to help it feel a little less shit. We're all going through something.
I think you were really kind and empathetic to Dream stans, more than I've seen from any content creator. If they bully you they didn't watch the video because this was a breath of fresh air. And speaking of fresh air, and fridge biohazards I currently have a bag of what is just mold now because I wanted to see what happened to some cheese that was slightly moldy, I found it yesterday after nearly a year. I'm an adult with a child
As someone who briefly had a small Twitch following (15-20 viewers) it is incredibly obvious 1. If someone following you is a child and 2. How you should NOT speak to that person knowing that they are a child. Those with lower levels of maturity are extremely easy to differentiate and I made it a point as a streamer to ban anyone who seemed too immature for discord from my server. It is really not very difficult to set boundaries between yourself and younger viewers. Then again, maybe that’s why I will never be as popular as Dream, I had too many boundaries. 😅
Also, when I say child, I mean minors. Just to clarify. The difference between a 17 year old and a 21 year old is shockingly stark.
I'd like to genuinely thank you for portraying parasocial relationships in a whole, not just "ur weird if u feel like this". Especially as someone with a horribly personal connection with one of the creators youve mentioned in this video (jschlatt. yeah, i know.) relationships like this are so fucked, and my attatchment to jschlatt has genuinely fucked me up horribly. Ive spent countless nights crying and hating myself both for liking him and for not being him. its not his fault, but in the case of Dream it absolutely is.
Dude get help
i don't mean to be rude but like literally anyone in the world and you chose him? mutton chop racist?
you are braver than anyone who has ever done anything
"this is really offensive and hurtful to real victims" is just a stupid thing to say... I think you had a great take on it. 😌
Dream has some weird takes but it's generally true that your allegations should be well organised into a single timeline and contain bulletproof evidence. After the string of blatantly false allegations against other people on the dsmp it goes without saying you won't be taken seriously unless you actually prove what you're claiming.
@@anitaremenarova6662 except that’s not always possible. Sometimes there’s not a bunch of “bulletproof” evidence to neatly organize. Then what?
@@anitaremenarova6662 I had no evidence when my rapist raped me. Nothing to get people to believe me. I refused to get police involved because we’re both trans people and there’s a chance it could’ve gone really bad, plus they likely wouldn’t have believed me and would’ve done nothing as they usually do. So I have nothing except my word. It was just me and them, except one time my partner was a witness.
@@guytrashgurtdog But Dream did not rape anyone. All of his wrongdoings should be digitally archived. Why isn't the accuser providing those? You're conflating two different things here.
“getty images search result for when you search alumni” 😭😭😭
im starting to feel like my comments on your videos are getting repetitive, but i just cannot stress what a talented writer you are. i am a former dsmp fan and the way you described the shame i feel abt it now is very accurate. this was great
genuinely thank u sm for this video, ive been a fan of creators who are only associated with him and never been a personal fan of him so ive always been critical of his behaviors (especially as a poc) while being intrinsically aware of his actions but it was frustrating because any criticism of him always ignored nuances and didnt account for the demographic of the fan bases, immediately dismissing the valid communities built. this gave room for him to build even more parasocial relationships as he was able to dismiss ALL critique as mindless hate, which was seen in the recent allegations.
so glad you brought up his twitlonger because he has a tendency to bring up buzzwords and never truly apologize. he deflects and minimizes, so while he definitely admitted to, at best, something highly irresponsible, he was able to skew it by making it seem as if it wasn’t that bad to which his stans take it as an immediate pass for the entire situation.
another mcyt named bizly has been critical of dream before and when the allegations came out, he had pointed out that even if the claims were false, it is still highly irresponsible and inconsiderate to immediately go “they’re fake cant hear you” and go on the defensive, and in the past bizly has also discussed the parasocial relationships dream harbors and he had faced massive amounts of harassment for it (bringing this up just to show that even when members of his own social circle speak out against it, dream still manages to escape scott free) ((also dream hardly truly utters the words “i’m sorry” as in all his apologies he manages to deflect some of the blame, and truly never attempted to quell his fans from attacking bizly))
it’s infuriating that he is such a prominent name, considering the mcyt scene is so vast and harbors some of the most diverse gaming communities (which there is still not much in the name of diversity sometimes but by comparison, mcyt is leagues ahead of other gaming scenes) and there is just always an association with him, and whats a bit odd to me is that not even that long ago everyone was so keen to dismiss and hate on dream for arbitrary things (his sexuality, his fanbase demographic, the speedrun) but the silence surrounding actual harmful acts? very sinister.
sorry for the long comment, just genuinely so glad there is someone so eloquent actually speaking about this and taking into account the nuances
ANOTHER BIZLY FAN IN THE WILD‼️‼️ i know this is off topic to your comment but out of curiosity do you listen to just roll with it as well??? i dont have any social media for the most part and never get to talk to people about the podcast WAHAHA
@@ARACHNIDPARTY i only watche the jrwi podcast with wilbur in it and that was a while ago im sorry 😭but i do see a pretty tight knit fanbase for it on tumblr if u ever wish to venture there :]
@@beachbummrr lol thats totally ok!! and thanks for the recommendation, i might get back on tumblr WHAHAHA
Ayy, same boat here mate! Not a direct fan but A fan of people who associate with him. You made some great points; I hope you’re doing well ♥️ I need to check out Bizly I guess lmao
almost an hour on a topic I can’t wait to see you cover??? RO YOU’RE SPOILING US
This is probably the most compassionate video on the topic of fandoms I've ever seen. Almost nobody starts or ends with the acknowledgement that just because "fandom" has become a marketable, sellable-to category in the public eye that people still get bullied for being.... nerds, essentially. I feel for these kids. A lot of my childhood and teenhood was the same, it just happened offline, I was just existing and liking a thing and almost never even talking about it to anyone because.... talking about it just got me mocked. It got me branded, it got me isolated, it got me denied access to social groups because I was somehow doing something wrong by having fun and enjoying myself. And the bullying is so much worse now because of the way it can be decentralised, a dozen people can be tweeting at you to off yourself and that's a much smaller mental burden on THEM and a much greater one on the victim.
And the rest of it... well, trust Ms Ramdin to have the best takes and a compassionate perspective on the way people are bad, sometimes. Between this and the JDvsAH video, I'm no longer surprised by the nuance, I'm simply... enjoying it. It's like a pressure valve, hearing someone make things that make sense.
I really love this video, I've been in so many fandoms that have been made fun of all the time (kpop, anime, etc.) And it really encapsulates why the reaction to allegations and insults are so personal. It's a usually very unhealthy attachment where you don't know where your Fandom self ends and when your real self begins. It becomes such a big part of you that any attack against what you enjoy is an attack on your own self. I really appreciate the respect you gave people in this video -t hough I don't expect less haha, it's still well appreciated since people are so quick to judge and hate on people in fandoms as they're easy targets, especially since their reactions can be quite emotional.
You worded this so well!
When I was a dream watcher I related to him and the way he dealt with controversy, but fortunately I was old enough to recognize that within myself and see it as a red flag. I like to be right. I have been the powerful one in relationships, and, despite my best intentions, I have hurt people. I'm lucky enough to not be a public figure and to be young, still learning and growing from my past toxic relationships. What I have done in the past hurt people, and I was also hurt. Being idolized by someone is very fun until you realize you have become their everything, and suddenly your actions have a lot more consequences than they did before. Thankfully I recognized those imbalances in my own relationships and isolated myself from them. I am still learning what healthy attachment looks like, and I'm happier now than I have been in a while.
I do not defend dream. There is no excuse for his behavior and how it's been perpetuated over the years, especially given his status and track record. The fact that he doesn't have a PR team is continuously staggering. I do understand him though, and I think that's what made me ultimately detach from the fanbase. The amount of obsession about him as a person is not healthy for him or his viewers. He cultivates a cult-like culture because it feels good and gets him money. I genuinely don't think he thinks about the effects that has on him or the psyche of his very young fanbase.
I hope dream is deplatformed, or at the very least that his current methods change. He consistently causes harm with his actions (though I believe he doesn't intend to) and that's grossly negligent and scummy. It's reflective of Twitter culture to its natural conclusion. Deifying people who want to be deified leads to power imbalances and abuse. It's not safe and it's not healthy, but it is incredibly attractive.
(Tangent I think it's pretty funny that dream's character in the Minecraft roleplay is literally a god with a poor conception of boundaries)
glad you were able to recognize those traits and work to better yourself!! get that character development bestie 💪💪
I know ro probably won't see this but the ending of this video stopped me from going back to a toxic relationship.. I don't think ro could ever realized how much some simple sentences she has said have helped me so so much.... or how some unglamourized experiences she has had (like with ocd), make me feel truely understood on a real level that I have never found anywhere else.. I hope some part of her knows that SHE TOO is the parasocial comfort youtuber and distraction from life, for at least one person going through a terrible time. ❤
joint custody? i think i can smoke this thing all by myself
The descriptiveness of the insults in this video fucking kills me, fantastic work.
"third chair trumpet" 💀 Don't make me scream like that
happy to say i scrolled through all the comments in this video (bc i have nothing better to do) and out of 1.3k comments, 8 were hate comments. as a fan of dream myself, this was a really good and educational video. this whole grooming situation really made me step back and be able to criticize a lot of the ways dream responds to controversy. your videos are a delight to watch, as always
I started doing the same thing and I’m so happy you went through 1000 comments first esp because I go through the replies too. I’m so glad there’s only been 8. I could feel Ro’s anxiety radiating through the screen. I hope that’s as far as it goes. Ro was so brave to do this. I know nothing about Minecraft but just through other YT videos over the years I’m aware of Dream and how dedicated his stans are and you don’t want to mess with them. It’s good to see you said you were a fan and not a stan. There lies a big difference esp if people now know where “stan” originated from and it’s not good. Thanks for doing the work!
Ro, your roasts and run on jokes kill me every time. You're so creative and funny. Every insult/roast makes me laugh more as they compound on each other.
You have a wonderful balance of comedic and serious and I really like it!
I love how their edits cut themselves off in the beginning 😂😭
"3rd chair trumpet" killed me more than it probably should have
as a former dream stan, i want to thank you for making this video. although i didnt get the chance to fill out the survey (which is totally okay sending it out so many times was crazy), i was looking forward to this because i knew you would be able to provide the level of nuance needed for this topic, and you absolutely delivered. you hit the nail on the fucking head.
wonderful video as always, stay safe !
I'm not even a dream fan but the part toward the end where you're telling people they aren't destined to be hated, alienated, or ostracized for their mental health and identity made me cry. Not to be doing the thing in the video and getting weirdly parasocial here, but as a nonbinary person who is very much only really dealing with my mental health and untangling these things in my twenties, i just want you to know how much I appreciate your content, the way you articulate your thoughts on these things while maintaining a consistent level of empathy or at least the attempt at understanding someone else on a human level is really, really inspiring. I don't know you but I'm glad your content and voice exists.
I just hope gen z turns out okay in the long run. They all seem so internet brained, and it’s kind of concerning.
I'm getting to the end of this and I gotta say--this is really well done. You bring up great points that are *universal* not just about internet culture. I'm 31 now and have been involved in my local rave scene for 11 years and a lot of the allegations Dream has can be applied to soooo many powerful figures and their fans. It's truly sickening how often everything you are describing.happens.
as a former HARDCORE dream stan this video is very healing for me. very rough period of my life and its good to hear many people have had a similar situation
same here!!
Ro you're a gorgeous woman and fans of rich white people making mediocre music shouldn't have any say over that.
Thank you for making this difficult video. Also I can't believe how seen I feel about liking drum and bass.
Personal favorite part of the video has to be the line graph bit, you hit the nail on the head when talking about how stans treat influencers. Really enjoyed the roast portion as well, I love your writing style. The emotional and personal segments were brilliant too. Like always you knocked it out of the ball park. You're incredibly talented and i'm excited to see you grow. Love ya Ro
i had a friend last year who was a huge dream stan (and underage) and they got his private snapchat and stuff before i met them and they had proof and showed it off to me all the time. I didn’t realize it was weird until this
i think your insight on being locked into a community is so fucking good. thank you for not just attacking and running, thank you for loving on the people who are stuck because of mental health. you never cease to be kind, youre doing great
What scares me the most is that dream still is being supported by these other MCYT creators, and everyone acts like them just not watching dream will solve the issue. All these creators interact and can monetarily support him through putting him in videos, etc. Even the people who claim to care abt the grooming allegations, obviously do not care since they obsess with dream’s friends, who are still friends regardless of the stuff he’s done. They are enabling him, providing him a means of escaping accountability.
The parasocial relationships dream has with his fans is DEFINITIV weird
i think this video was done really well and i appreciate u putting yourself out there. i just wanted to say that around 29:30 you said that 93% of the survey takers were queer and then went on to talk about how large a portion of dream stans are queer, but 93% of the people who are dream stans and could access the survey are queer. the people who did the survey likely follow you on twitter and are more likely to be queer because they follow you, so 93%, while a large portion, doesn’t necessarily correlate to the portion of dream stans who are queer. it’s whatever but i just thought i’d share idk
Yeah I'd be interested in dropping the link to the poll in a place where it is mainly dream stans and less crossover, even just to get the self identity statistics
id agree but ive seen the in-community polls on the subject and they show similar numbers. the vast majority pf the mcyt fan community is queer
26:22 The fact that this paragraph doesn't even cover everything he's done is crazy, this person didn't mention his homophobic comments
I’ve had a mob of people attack me online as well for something i didnt even do, I totally understand the fear. Its like the world is against you and no matter what you say you just add fuel to the fire. You get so much hate and harassment for the littlest things. I don’t think I’ve ever even swore at somebody online negatively unless it was jokingly, i cant imagine how people type death threats and think its ok. Some people might say that you being scared is an overreaction, and they obviously have not been the target of a mob of haters before. Its awful. We support you and frankly this video was amazingly done. I just hope people take time to digest the meaning without instantly hating
rose, yours is one of the single most important voices among the commentary age of youtube. you ask real questions and you do it with the most amazing and open minded approach. i tell my friends who are parents to watch you because their kids get to grow up in a world influenced by you and it is a beautiful thing to witness. i hope you continue to inspire growth in all you do.
Incredible well made video, Ro. I always appreciate your cinematography towards the end. I really resonated with your ending point: "Change isn't the end of the world. Learning isn't apocalyptical. And sometimes, you have to leave a chapter of your life behind to truly accept what happened during it." Learning to let go is one of the most important things any human being can learn.
I'm a year late, but I wanted to thank you for making this video. I appreciate the empathy you put forth towards Dream fans, former or otherwise. As someone who was part of that community at one point, your message resonated with me, and I knew a lot of people who could have used to hear that. I really do hope everyone who was once a Dream fan found community elsewhere, and I hope any victims are given the space and ability to heal.
The only victims of this whole mess were Dream (relentlessly harassed on Twitter and his family swatted and doxxed many times, you get the point) and Jamie (she was harassed after the burner account posted the fake accusations)
It is totally okay to feel scared and anxious when many fandoms, including the Dream community, is full of negativity and hatred for people. Know that you did a really good thing, putting a lot of things people have said and thought into a video. I don’t stan Dream, I used to be a part of the SMP fandom and back when I was in it it seemed so incredible and amazing and supportive, and I’ve met so many people who are still my friends today who were in the fandom. But there’s just too much stress and conflict and idk how to put it into words. But thank you for making this video because I think it speaks for so many people who also feel this way but are too scared to say it. You should be proud of what you’ve done and how much you’ve accomplished. Happy Halloween🎃
i dont know who you are, i dont know if this video will be good, but the intro skit was so fucking good ive subbed, notifs on, liked, commented, it watered my crops, the piano used has been stuck in my head for six years, i cant sleep, started crying
thank you for speaking about this. truly.
i'm an ex-dream fan, and after finding out about this situation, immediately me and some other people on tumblr have tried to spread awareness about it. though, we felt like we were yelling into the void, as it's honestly a pretty small corner of tumblr and most of the voices were coming from twitter, voices defending dream.
we tried our hardest to keep this situation alive with all the big things happening around it, but eventually most of us grew desperate. we gave up, some moved to new blogs entirely, leaving this shitshow behind.
it was honestly really tragic to see how the situation was already being swept under the rug; most of the people whom i follow in the fandom either didnt acknowledge it in the slightest, or made one statement about "staying neutral" (all while still drawing dream fanart and directly supporting him)
i myself just gave up on trying to spread anything else on this matter like 2 or 3 days ago. then i stumbled on this video.
once again, thank you. and i'm also glad that you didnt just talk about the situation, but also called him out for his irresponsibility with how he handles his platform as a whole, i also loved the survey idea.
i've said that i'm an ex fan, but that wasn't until the grooming situation. and as you know, there were tons of controversies beforehand. and when watching this video, i realized that i was either completely unaware of most of the other controversies, or heavily underestimated some of them as i do not have twitter and just take whatever people said on other platforms (for this situation however i did log on to twitter to find proofs).
so i'm glad you're also shedding lights on that as well.
(on a lighter note, i really really really love the personality you portray! i love the vibe of the video and i adore your jokes! you've just earned a new subscriber!)
the thing that really struck me about the whole dream situation, as someone who used to be a fan for some time but stopped after continuous scandals and the such, was the entire twitter community. it made me sick to see people so adamantly denying and trying to prove wrong the allegations. what made me feel even more sick though, the people that were outwardly cheering that this had come up, cheering over the victim’s pain caused by dream.
Ro, this is so good. I love how you use the behind the camera perspective to humanize and center your own vulnerability. Meeting people with respect for their perspective and validating their feelings is the first part of reaching anyone, and I think you master that. Bless, and good luck
when she said "oh yeah, 'miniclip,' oh yeah, 'addicting games'" i took actual, physical damage.
“Celery is his favorite vegetable” has to be my favorite ro ramdin burn 😂
Love celeries! But her Dream insults were wonderful! 😂
One thing that's really memorable to me is when Dream quote tweeted someone on Twitter who very mildly criticized him. He has a huge following and should've known better, and at this point it was common knowledge how his fans react. It was like he was using his power just to be petty.
The person he quote tweeted was 16 if I remember correctly. They had been blackmailed because someone found their address. Tons of harassment etc.
Another similar situation(s) had happened before so it's not like Dream was unaware this would happen. His response to the previous situation(s) was basically just "well, I can't control my fans." No apology, not a single "hey, don't dox people." He put the blame off himself completely instead of doing the bare minimum of telling his fans to not put people's livelihoods at risk.
didnt he literally say "doxxing doesn't do anything" in response to the situation? which means not only is he indifferent to the doxxing, he genuinely thinks there's nothing wrong with it.
@@nessmarie6044 he said doxxing is bad on multiple occasions
IDK why or how but when i turned 15 i just got all of DSMP content out of my life, never in my life have i been happier.
massive W
Several years ago, a friend of mine was one of a few people who came out about a popular content creator widely considered a smol bean using his fans as an inappropriate dating pool. He got fired from his (content creation) job & dropped from collaborative projects. Now, it’s not considered a big deal because everyone was technically legal, & his new fans are the “and? triggered?” type. My friend had recently turned 18 & he was in his mid or late 20s, not to mention he was really popular at the time (& got popular again now, just in a completely different circle) & she was like, a random girl with 200 twitter followers, many of whom thought he was the best thing since sliced bread.
I don’t know a lot about Dream or the allegations, but a lot of the stuff I have seen in passing reminds me of what she went through.
I used to be a big fan but I’ve become really disillusioned. Looking at that twitlonger he put out felt gross. Even if the claims aren’t true, the way it was worded feels so icky??? Idk
What twitlonger?
@@anitaremenarova6662 when he responded to grooming allegations
i was groomed by someone 3 years older than me, and he genuinely fucked up my life. there is definitely a power dynamic. i was 12 when it began, and he was 16 when i met him (3 years and 7 months.) if you are 18, you are not 100% mature. theres no way. both minors, but theres a power dynamic. both legally adults, BUT THERE IS A POWER DYNAMIC. we shouldnt have to say this, it should be recognized to begin with.
27:55 The main evidence of the manatreed situation was actually never disproven and still holds true. A lot of people just decided that it was fake and made up reasons to justify their perspective, eventually becoming the surviving opinion.
46:00 that "I'll be good" really caught me off guard cuz it sounded EXACTLY like the danish "op igen", which means "get up again"
Fit the context too
i’m here like a month late, after seeing this in my youtube recommended for ages because as an ex dream stan, even though i do not in any way support him anymore, i still kinda have that same fear of people outside of the community speaking on this kind of stuff as i did when i was in the fandom, to the point where i have around 60 muted words on twitter relating to dream and the dsmp as a whole, because i’m on a different side of twitter now where most people heavily dislike dream and will interact with negative content about him frequently (i remember the day of the face reveal i had to mute every term ppl used to call him ugly and he was still all over my tl)
it feels a little hyperbolic to call the dream fandom cult-ish, but i was so hyperfixated for like a year, dream was honestly what my emotional state depended on for a while and i couldn’t even see how weird that was when i was in it. i was very active on twitter during the time, and it was so normalised there - parasocial relationships were a joke in the way everyone was vaguely self-aware enough to know that’s what was happening but not aware enough to see it as wrong.
every controversy had evidence refuting it (no matter how weak the evidence was), expose threads were debunked and detailed defences were made, and the people who were ‘antis’ were so aggressive that it pushed everyone even further into their echo chambers. i wasn’t even willing to look at the other side because of the things these same people had done to my mutuals, and to dream himself (i still think the fact people were posting face leaks and his supposed address was weird to say the least).
when you’re so parasocially attached to a creator that you will take any excuse to not hear the other side - the mass harassment was just the final nail in the coffin.
i’ve experienced this community firsthand. i know just how it sucks you in and makes you believe you’re right and the rest of the internet hates you for an ‘undeserved’ reason. and honestly, i have some sympathy for those who are defending him now, because i couldn’t say i wouldn’t be doing the same thing if i hadn’t left the fandom.
it’s horrible, and i hate the fact i can see myself in that position, because id never want to defend a groomer. but even now, there’s some part of me that wants it to be false because the idea of someone i’ve invested so much time and money and emotional attachment into could be such a horrible person is sickening, and this parasocial attachment still lingers on even when i purposefully try to detach myself from it. i can only imagine what it would be like for people who were still fans when the allegations dropped.
when you’re desperate to be right about someone, you’ll take any evidence - no matter how flimsy - that disproves the opposition, so you don’t have to detach yourself.
anyways sorry for the essay that i doubt anyone will read, but i wanted to share my thoughts as someone who was very active in the community
if you got this far thank you for reading haha
54:25 I didn’t expect a whole-hearted, earnest, empathetic response. I’m not a part of the mcyt fandom but your words of kindness and the sentiment of ‘not being determined for pain’ brought me to tears.
This is a wonderful, well made and excellently executed video. Thank you for including the intermissions to discuss how you were feeling. It was very honest and real. ❤
I'm not even a dream fan/stan/whatever but I connected HARD with that ending monologue. I'm sure a lot of people, especially queer individuals, relate to that feeling and that fear. Particularly for me it's the "made me worse" thing. Certain circles of friends are fine with toxicity, encourage it because it's "funny." But after a while it wears on a person, it wore on me and I would get angry because they were all just being mean and yelling at each other and when I pointed it out they just sat there blankly like "what do you expect?"
But you're absolutely right. It is not predestined that we fall into these friend groups over and over. And the one I'm in right now is supportive and uplifting and even chose to support me when someone from the previous friend group complained and made a "them or me" ultimatum. I would never ask that of them, but it spoke volumes to how they value me and see me for who I am that I had them stand by me.
Sorry to like...mildly trauma dump, but you made me cry a little. It just hit harder than I expected a video about a minecraft streamer to hit. You're too good at your job there, Ro.
I think the worst stans have to be swifties. I pray for anyone that says anything less than praise for her and her work. But honestly, stans of anyone can get weirdly feral. Parasocial relationships are something I think has only heightened with online creators (although I know it's always existed) and I'm not sure what solutions there could be to so many young people becoming personally attached to creators.
I thought it would be BTS stans or Barbies. I don't see an awful lot of the Swifties
I’ve seen someone claim to be a swiftie but they were pretty chill.
I was a little nervous to click this video, because I hate drama vids, and am invested in the mine craft fandom. But I really loved your thoughtful look at the culture. I think you really got it. It helped me process it all