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#luckily my ability to pay my electric bill does not hinge on whether someone decides to do that
phantomrose96 · 3 years
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People in the online generation get so goddamn weird about Internet Content Creators:tm: as soon as those creators start making any kind of money off their work. This is especially true if the person being weird is one of those backers and therefore "entitled" to being horrible because they've paid $5. And it's completely indistinguishable from the way Boomers treat service workers.
Like any Online Millennial or Gen Z would balk at the idea of saying a single mean word to their waiter, but as soon as the creator they toss pennies at on patreon sets a toe out of line, (or not even out of line, maybe just not catering to this person's specifics wants, or not producing content as high-quality as it used to be) suddenly the Terminally Online are happy to unleash their unbridled fury, frothing opinions, and full-blown karen I'll take my business elsewhere and tell everyone to never shop here again-ness.
Except the difference is an entitled Boomer will march out of a store in a huff and be done with it, while the internet will try to snowball and dogpile until the creator is run off.
Like I've seen people get so weird about the McElroy content, and how "not-as-good" this that or the other thing is now, and they say this with such justified fury because the McElroys make money. This isn't "eh I've stopped listening as much since I don't like the direction." This is "how dare the McElroys not live up to my quality expectations when they're making money. don't they know they have to earn the right to have money with a good enough monkey-dance??"
Trust fund babies will ride out their McMansion lives never lifting a finger, but an internet content creator pulling in enough money to make a normal human living in a way that does not cater exactly to some segment of the internet's expectations is grounds for the most dehumanizing vitriol imaginable.
And no, before someone asks this is not apologism for people creating kickstarters and running off with the money. This is about how often a severely bad-faith take or plain cruelty is justified and propagated because the subject under storm is a "professional" on account of being compensated for their work.
I'd so much rather have a faceless corporation sign my paychecks for faceless work until I die than stake my livelihood on creating internet content I'm passionate about. I'd be happy to never receive a single dime from the internet. Because as soon as I do that, the public owns me, and the internet would be allowed to waggle a dollar above my head and say "dance monkey dance" without the slightest hint of irony. Or worse, they can say "remember that time we gave you a dollar?" "remember that time you received a dollar from someone?" as an absolute shut-down to any discussion of whether a content creator should have a right to do anything which does not cater directly to their fans' expectations.
Boomers' entitled harassment of service workers didn't go away with the new generation, it just got rebranded.
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