The "Damn Daniel" kids have an LG commercial.
No, seriously. Daniel Lara and Joshua Holz, the two students responsible for the "Damn Daniel" video have a commercial advertising the LGV20. In the ad, Daniel can be seen doing his thing (walking) while Josh also does his thing (saying "damn, Daniel.") The pair are backed up by a group of 90's-esque R&B singers crooning about how smooth the phone's audio-video recording quality is and praising Daniel's "West Coast style," whatever that means.
It makes sense that LG would try to capitalize on the "Damn Daniel" phenomenon. The kids were after all a viral sensation a few months back, and mentioning the pair's signature phrase still elicits recognition, whether it be laughter or agonized eye rolls. The original tweet containing the video has gotten over 300,000 retweets, and the phrase has been used on the social media accounts of companies like Axe, Denny's, and of course, Vans.
Earlier this year, the boys made an appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, where they were gifted, among other things, a lifetime supply of Vans shoes. But that was in February, a mere nine days after the video was posted. Since then, the boys have done very little to continue pushing their brand, but their 15 minutes won't quite seem to end. The pair recently did the ad with LG, companies still use their catchphrase on social media, and it's even been used in television. It's clear that "Damn Daniel" is going nowhere.
This is nothing new. Take the phrase "on fleek" created by Viner Kayla Newman in 2014. Newman, also known as Peaches Monroee, originally used the phrase in a Vine that many of us can recite from memory: "we in this b*tch, finna get crunk. Eyebrows on fleek, da fuq." Newman's video has gotten over 47 million loops, the measurement of how many times a Vine has been viewed. Newman's phrase has been used by everyone from Ariana Grande to iHop to your aunt who tries way too hard to stay up to date on everything youth culture. "On Fleek" has hit a height that "Damn Daniel" has not; while both videos are extremely popular, "On Fleek" has entered the language and culture in a way that "Damn Daniel" has yet to. Everything is "On Fleek"' — outfits, hair, nails, and so much more.
There is one difference though: Newman has never received endorsements or a lifetime supply of anything as a result of her hit video. This is something we see often when the creators of incredibly popular online content are black. A more recent example is Nicholas Fraser, better known as the man responsible for the "Why You Always Lying" video. Fraser's video, a play on Next's hit "Too Close," has over 69 million loops on Vine, and the original video on Instagram has been liked over 13 thousand times. Fraser, like Newman, has seen little outside of companies using his video to promote themselves.
So why is this? Why do Daniel Lara and Joshua Holz receive guest spots on daytime television and appear in commercials, when their videos are considerably less creative and humorous than their black counterparts? The answer can be summed up in a concept known as white mediocrity.
White mediocrity functions as an extension of white privilege. You may have heard your parents explain the concept through phrases like "you have to be twice as good to get half of what they have." White mediocrity is the inverse of this phrase, essentially "you can be half as good and still get twice what they have gotten." The "Damn Daniel" video is evidence of this; the clips that make up the video don't seem to be thought out. Lara walks, and Holz videos him and his outfits while saying "Damn, Daniel." By contrast, Fraser's video is extremely well planned and intentionally comedic, copying the styles of dress and dance in 90's R&B videos. Even Newman's video is better planned. Though only speaking into the camera, she created a new word to use in the video.
Despite being a creative force online, young black creators often receive less recognition and reap fewer benefits as a result of their output than their white counterparts. White mediocrity allows white creators and online entertainers to attain fame and recognition for far less than black entertainers. Vine user Nick Mastodon gained almost one million followers and over a billion loops just from posting videos of his nephew Gavin. Sam White, known online as samwhiteout gained 66,000 followers on twitter just from being a white member of the historically black fraternity Kappa Alpha Psi.
Sam White stands as an example of the power of white mediocrity. In the videos that gained White his online popularity he can be see strolling with his fraternity brothers, and doing the Kappa's signature shimmy. There is nothing inherently wrong with this; there have been white members of black Greek organizations before and White will certainly not be the last. However, white gained recognition for his shimmy while his brothers gained none, due only to the fact that he was a white boy in a black frat. His strolling was nothing special, and his shimmy not as smooth as his brothers. Yet he gained fame for being white and mediocre in a black space.
Meanwhile, black content creators continue to have to be twice as good to gain recognition. Take YouTuber Caleon Fox. Fox's account, SenseiLeFox has over 100,000 subscribers, and his videos regularly top 100,000 views. His videos are creative and funny, often playing off of current cultural themes and including original music. His most popular video to date, "When Bae Hits You With That 'What Are We?'" currently has over three million views, and helped to launch the career of rapper Lil' Yachty. Another one of his videos, "Now I'm Mad" was insanely popular on Twitter. Even with these credentials behind him, Fox's name doesn't have nearly the recognition of some of his white counterparts.
It's no secret that black youth create the culture online. Black creators are responsible for slang, dances, music, and set the trends that then leak into the mainstream culture. If it weren't for young black folk on the Internet, nothing would be on fleek; we wouldn't be asking why you're always lying and we definitely wouldn't know what to do when bae hits you with that "what are we?" Sadly it's thankless work, and back content creators are forced to live out the old trope taught to us by our parents, forever twice as good.
