Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers says that anyone can master a skill with 10,000 hours of practice. Logan Paul, a vlogger who is in deep sh*t for a video he has previously posted, released a statement through Twitter on January 3rd stating that he is “taking time to reflect… no vlog for now… see you soon”. However, on January 7th, Logan Paul’s father has released a statement that Logan Paul will be returning to his to YouTube channel, calling Logan Paul’s video as “bad judgement” and that “we all f*ck up”.
Another example in America of white privilege is Paul’s father explaining his behavior as if it’s reasonable and just a “mistake”. Yeah, he might’ve not meant to have a large scale issue from this video. Hopefully, he didn’t. However, his morale still lacked long enough for him to even post it on the internet. It wasn’t live streamed. He had to edit it and THEN post it which meant he had plenty of time to think it through.
Logan Paul recently has created a video on his YouTube channel in which he entered a “suicide forest” in Japan. Before Paul created this video, he had 17,111 followers. After this video, he has increased to over 100,000 followers as well as 16 million Instagram followers. Furthermore, the number had increased to 81,000 the day after the video had been posted. In this video, he showed a graphic image of a hanging man in Aokigahara which is a popular destination for committing suicide. His commentary showed his insensitivity as he yelled to the dead man “Yo, are you alive?” as well as “Are you f*cking with us?”.
In the background, you can hear him and his friends laughing at this situation. The video had gone on for fifteen minutes of nervous laughter and commentary. The fact that he gained so many followers due to this instance already reveals how much publicity can cause an individual to gain attention. By giving this man attention, we are saying that it is ok to make fun of suicide. We are increasing his platform to make new videos that will be watched, rather than taking away views. If his followers unfollowed him, he would no longer have any power in the social media world.
Paul has released two apologies. One in writing which has come across as defensive, as well as one on camera with Paul looking tearful. Paul explains that the laughter, as well as his commentary, was his coping mechanism. However, this came across as him making fun of the man, as well as being incredibly insensitive. Logan Paul, if this truly was a “mistake” how could it have been going on for fifteen minutes? Where is your morale? If this truly made you feel as sorry as you say you are, why didn’t you recognize this throughout the time that it had been surfacing the internet?
It is not only offensive to me personally but to our nation as a whole. While we are working for civil rights and equality through better understanding individuals, we have occurrences such as this. It is like we take two steps backwards everytime we step forward. While there will always be situations as such that arise in our society since we can’t control insensitive individuals, we must choose to unfollow and fight against them. We cannot choose to give them the attention they are asking for so desperately.
By having his face appear on every news station, newspaper, magazine, blog, etc. talking about his horrid actions rather than how to fight against him, we are doing ourselves a disservice. We live for the gossip rather than the betterment. Suicide is the tenth leading cause of death in America so it should be no question as to why it’s not something to take lightly. Most of us have been affected by suicide in some way, which proves that we are no stranger to the tragic reality that it is.
Logan Paul, it is time to hang up your vlog persona and step away from YouTube. It is a shame that YouTube cannot block you itself from coming back to it. You are a disgrace and an embarrassment to American pop culture. You are nowhere near to have learned your lesson nor are you ready to come back to the YouTube atmosphere. Please get a reality check. This is NOT an example of suicide prevention, it's a mockery.
