Logan’s run out of chances

WARNING: Bell-end alert!

It’s vacuous, self-obsessed, YouTube phenomenon-in-trouble-again time!

Yes, the ‘star’ we love to hate, Logan Paul, has invoked the wrath of Google once more, and they’ve suspended advertising on the blonde berk’s channels because of his “pattern of behaviour”.

Not content with uploading a video of a dead body found in a Japanese forest notorious for suicides, he’s further irked the internet’s grandees by joking on social media about eating detergent capsules and produced a video showing himself firing a taser at a dead rat. Classy.

Strangely, the video blogger doesn’t seem to be in trouble for publicising the idiotic and dangerous “Tide Pod Challenge” of eating a laundry product, even if his actions do leave me metaphorically foaming at the mouth.

Nor is the self-confessed “very polarising dude” being condoned for tasering a deceased rodent. No, he’s been suspended as his actions might cause “significant harm” to the reputation of YouTube, according to their chief exec, Susan Wojcicki. In a land of rampant vapidity, Logan has been crowned king of stupid.

Maybe I’m just too old to understand the world of hugely successful video bloggers like Logan and beauty blogger Zoella. It’s certainly a lucrative business, with millions to be made and devoted, young, followers clamouring to buy whatever they choose to promote.

Fine. I lost interest in youth culture sometime around Oasis vs Blur. But I do find it concerning that the platforms carrying the Youtubers’ videos seem to care more about their reputation (and advertising revenue) than the negative influence of their stars.

Set an example? Only if it gets a cheap laugh.

This post first appeared as the third piece in my column/page in The Mail and the News & Star, on the 16th of February 2018, where it was re-titled slightly as "Logan has run out of chances, which wrecked the 1970s film reference.

I haven't checked today, but I suspect Logan is still a knob.

(CD A-Z: Visage - "The Damned Don't Cry".)

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