The other day I got into it with a friend of mine who described military recruiters as groomers. Like woke, groomers appears to be a term that some people are attaching to anyone they don’t like regardless of whether it applies.
I’m a little surprised this isn’t getting more attention, though I suppose the “grooming” aspect is more of a current bugaboo so it gets all the attention. A few years ago, singer Amanda Palmer went on tour, but instead of hiring musicians to play some of the parts, she enlisted the aid of volunteers at each city. Palmer defended herself by saying this kind of performance was part of the show, but critics, including some professional musicians, just thought her behavior was exploitative.
One interesting thing about many YouTubers is the relationship they have with their fans. If I wanted to talk to Brad Pitt, the odds of me being able to engage in any kind of dialogue would be next to zero. But I can engage with YouTube, uh, personalities (celebrities?) in more direct ways and many of them certainly cultivate those kinds of parasocial relationships because it nets them more viewers and “donations.”
I guess what I meant by that was that I’m starting to find myself saying things that I’ve heard boomers say – that they don’t understand why people are complaining about X because back in the day things used to be so much worse.
So like here, yes, we find that youtubers and other internet celebrities are able to exploit young fans by getting free labor out of them, but like, at least they’re not raping them in the back of tour buses. And thus, I sound like an out of touch boomer.
…Yep… weird…but not grooming.
My recollection of childhood is that from at least 4th to 5th grade, we were beginning to discuss sex, making sexual jokes, teasing each other about sex and adult topics, playing games like “truth or dare” with risque requests, etc. Going into high school, kids started doing drugs, smoking, drinking, and having sex.
Later, as I saw people move into adulthood (getting around age 25), those around me became more proper, discussing serious things and keeping such topics off limits.
To me, this doesn’t sound like an adult bringing kids into sexual discussions. It sounds like an adult who interacts with children all the time and has kept up the lingo for the sake of interaction.
It is creepy and, properly speaking, she shouldn’t let herself be drawn into it and, properly, she should be setting an example for her audience of how an adult is supposed to behave. But I can see how if your business is to target people between the ages of 12 and 25, you might end up taking on an age inappropriate manner when dealing with them.
Personally, so long as she’s dating with people her age and acting like an adult with people her age, I’d just plonk it down as a reasonable business strategy. If she acts this way all the time, then I’d say that it would be best to get away from her audience for a while and spend more time with adults. If she’s forming romantic relationships with her audience then, clearly, that would be bad but nothing presented seems to say that.
Fart jokes, sex jokes, and pictures of butts don’t hurt anyone. It’s what kids do.
Yes, she did a series of increasing “innocently” sexual activities with a single young boy leading to her finally giving him her used panties.
And like “woke”, it’s a term that will soon have no meaning at all, because odds are that two people attempting to use the term won’t be able to understand each other because each one thinks it means something different.
I’ve never heard of “Miranda Sings” and have no interest in seeing her content based on the descriptions here. But none of the behavior described in this thread that is alleged to her sounds like “grooming”. It’s not even close. It’s just acting in a manner inappropriate for children, when children are around.
I’ve been an online gamer for decades. More than once I’ve been in a guild or clan or similar in-game organization that has included one or more minors. And sometimes when people chat (text or verbally), things will come out that you probably shouldn’t say when someone is 13 or younger. Often we’d chastise the person who forgets and says such things.
I’d never consider any of that “grooming”, as in trying to influence a minor. It’s absurd to say it is.
Honestly, it has gotten to the point where I treat accusations of “grooming” with the same credibility of those who accuse someone of being “woke” or a person who promotes ancient astronaut theories. It’s all nonsense. Rather than saying “groomer”, just say what a person actually did so we can judge them based on the merits of their actions. The word itself is something I no longer give credence to anymore.
Didn’t watch the video, I guess.
For the benefit of anyone who didn’t watch the video (which is worth watching), the “used” bra and panties were being worn by some guy – over his clothing – as they browsed the recipient’s Twitter on a livestream and thought it was great. She says “We need to send him something; how about the bra and panties?” and then jokes about his mom being “wtf?” when he receives them but not to worry because we can see the guy who is wearing them.
It’s inappropriate just because she’s mailing underwear to a minor but a lot less salacious than “Sent a boy her used panties” would suggest.
Also, doen’t he say in the video he was 17 at that point?
Yes underage still…but a little bit of difference between mailing a 13 year old and a 17 year old underwear even as a joke.
Were the underwear even sent?
I was/am a fan of the Miranda videos, though I mostly stopped watching them when they got repetitive (actually they always were, but that’s the nature of character comedy, you come up with something that people connect to, a la Red Skelton, and that’s what you do.) Colleen Ballinger is a very talented person who created this self-centered character with a very odd and unlikely way of pronouncing words that is annoying and funny at the same time. She had a very large following at one time, probably not what it was but she does tour, where she does a show that starts out as Colleen doing a semi-serious sort of show-biz act, then transforming onstage into Miranda, which is what everyone came to see. She also had a Netflix series of scripted comedies starring Miranda in her supposed home life. It was strange and good, for the first season anyway.
I thought she should have quit the Miranda stuff long ago, as she clearly has potential but being famous for playing such an annoying character - even Gomer Pyle had a good heart and meant well; Miranda never did - can stunt your commercial viability. I often thought it’s too bad she wasn’t around in the silent comedy days, her face is so pliable in a broad comedy sort of way, but as soon as she speaks you definitely either laugh or can’t turn her off soon enough.
I haven’t read all these posts and know nothing about the controversy, but since so many people here seem not to have known who she is until she stepped in it, I thought I’d provide a bit of context. I’m a guy, over 50, not ashamed to say I liked the Miranda stuff.