Shane Dawson, a Youtuber that has been on the platform for about ten years, was under fire again for a joke he made in a podcast in 2015. In this podcast, he mentioned having engaged in some activity with his cat when he was 19. When the clip from this podcast was released on Twitter, there was a large amount of hate thrown Shane’s way for obvious reasons. However, Shane is known for his crude and sometimes offensive humor and this dates to his old videos from about four to five years ago. So, the question is: why are people bringing up this old joke he made or any of his old videos when he’s at the peak of his career and he’s profusely apologized for his mistakes? It seems like there’s always a witch hunt after Shane and other Youtubers when there are other Youtubers who have confessed to doing horrific things.
Unfortunately, this is not the first-time Shane Dawson has been under fire for something he said. In 2018, there was another clip that arose from his podcast which led people to think he was a pedophile, it was later shown that the clip was edited to only have the audio that supported this theory and was completely out of text. However, Shane still went out of his way to apologize again for the joke he made even though the audio was taken out of context. Usually when these sorts of “scandals” are exploited and blown out of proportion by these Youtube channels called “Drama channels”. The Youtubers behind these channels usually make money to talk about drama, whether it be about fellow youtubers or famous people, like TMZ. These channels, just like TMZ, usually “fluff” up the truth to get more views and ultimately rack up more income. The issue with this is that a lot of Youtubers (including Shane) suffer from this false defamation.
Shane Dawson has made a name for himself in the Youtube community, and various people have opinions of him because of his current and old content. His content now is considered very well thought out, intricate, and original. He has slowly put out videos that have hit millions of views each, every video of which has gone viral in a couple of hours. Nonetheless, his older videos are what gave him the voice he has now as a veteran Youtuber. But these videos have come at a high price in today’s “political correctness” climate.
Some of his older videos dating back to 6-8 years have what are now understood as to be extremely jokes. Yet, these were the type of videos that would attract a lot of attention in that time. Unfortunately, the theory that these videos brought a lot of attention does not excuse the fact that these videos did not age well. There are depictions of blackface in these videos along with other offensive stereotypical characters in his skits. Instead of pretending like they do not exist, Shane Dawson has acknowledged the videos and has apologized in various occasions and realizes that the videos are distasteful to say the least. Although the old videos, comments, and jokes he’s made are distasteful and uncalled for, bringing it up repeatedly does nothing to the situation. He has apologized about his actions and has acknowledged that his actions and words were offensive and he has owned up to it. Maybe this energy that is being focused on Shane Dawson should be focused on other people who have done worse and have not acknowledged or apologized for their actions.