Is there a reason people hate him? I don't watch his videos and I've only caught clips here and there, but isn't he mostly known for giving away money and helping people out? It's entertainment exploitation, for sure, but I'm sure the people he's helped out don't care much. I'd rather someone making money off of giving away money than someone making money and being an asshole to everyone.

Genuine question, I don't have any investment in defending him.

[–] philycheeze@sh.itjust.works 119 points 2 months ago

A lot of the “contestants” and people he helps are allegedly friends and family of him and his producers. I don’t know how true that is but that’s when general opinion of him really started sliding.

He was also one of the forerunners of the big dumb face on YouTube thumbnails and I know some people blame him for that trend too.

[–] Varyk@sh.itjust.works 77 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

When he says something like " I'm planting 1 million trees", he and 100 volunteers plant 2000 trees in one day and then he asks his followers to donate to a tree planting charity so that he and his followers "together", can plant a million trees.

it isn't that he's not doing good things in small quantity as long as it is filmed and he is guaranteed to make more money off the video than he spends, it's that his production methodology is so fucked up that you can't trust any of his videos, or by extension his claims or intentions.

[–] dejected_warp_core@lemmy.world 90 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Is there a reason people hate him? [...] isn’t he mostly known for giving away money and helping people out?

I may know why. The recently leaked PDF about how he runs his production company makes it patently clear: they aim to make successful YouTube videos, full stop.

Everything else is a side-effect. Not to suggest that they lack any ethics, but rather things like charity are there to get you to click and watch, nothing more. With enough exposure it's easy to get the impression that something is "off" with being click-bated like that. I'm not saying that behavior is deserving of hate, but it may help explain why people don't like his media.

Also, for people that are trying to make content in a much more honest fashion, Mr. Beast's popularity can be disheartening and frustrating. YouTube has clearly decided to reward this eyeball-grabbing behavior without any regards to the quality of the content. It's stuff made for the algorithm, rather than people showcasing their craft, skill, or interests. I'm guessing that people see their favorite makers and entertainers struggle to make a go of it by doing what they love, and see this guy come along and reap millions in revenue without any emotional connection to the output. To me, that's a recipe for anger.

Personally, I refuse to view popular click-bait stuff to begin with, and routinely filter such content out (click "not interested"). As a result, my YT recommendations never contain Mr. Beast content and I actually had to fire up a privacy window and click on this nonsense so I knew what the hell everyone was talking about.

[–] Varyk@sh.itjust.works 15 points 2 months ago (1 children)

good answer, I think you were trying to reply to the commenter I am also replying to, rather than me.

in case you wanted to reply directly to them instead.

[–] dejected_warp_core@lemmy.world 10 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Aw crap. Thanks!

[–] Varyk@sh.itjust.works 10 points 2 months ago

no worries, I didn't know anything about that leaked PDF.

I'm reading it now. thanks for sharing, definitely interesting.

[–] Gerudo@lemm.ee 48 points 2 months ago

I've posted about him before. To me, he's always given off very disingenuous vibes. The smile is fake, and when he is not actively talking in his video, he just looks dead inside. Someone posted a story about him in college obsessing about how to game the YouTube algorithm. His only purpose was to get the most views, it didnt matter the content. To me, he is 100% the reason behind the click baity headlines and thumbnails that infect YouTube to this day.

[–] ChairmanMeow@programming.dev 39 points 2 months ago

Mostly the whole exploitation part, which often goes too far and can be very humiliating or outright dangerous for participants. Some scrapped videos supposedly amounted to torture. Then there's the rigged giveaways and the fact that the dude just unnerves a lot of people because he, as this post demonstrates, doesn't smile with his eyes.

There were also allegations that one of his colleagues was a sex offender but as far as I know everyone including the purported victim ended up denying it, so I don't know how much people care about that still.

[–] LustyArgonianMana@lemmy.world 28 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

Info has come out via several credible interviews that: He's mostly only helping out his friends, stuff is rigged, stuff is abusive, he's abusive to staff, he's creepy towards women. So even most of the parts of him that were redeeming (helping people out) turned out to be fake.

[–] AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world 8 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

He hired and covered for at least one CSA perpetrator

[–] burgersc12@mander.xyz 24 points 2 months ago

This video came out a couple of months ago and it paints him in a really bad light

[–] funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works 16 points 2 months ago

what hasn't been mentioned so far is that his main business plan is get little children into gambling

[–] SkunkWorkz@lemmy.world 13 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

If he was a good person he wouldn’t collaborate with Logan Paul, you know the guy who sells energy drinks to kids and is a scam artist.

Donaldson is selling unhealthy lunch packs to kids together with Logan Paul and KSI, a professional bully.

Not to mention that several former employees have come out saying how abusive his work methods are. To employees and contestants.

[–] dejected_warp_core@lemmy.world 12 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I mis-posted my reply, which is located further down the thread in case you're interested.

[–] bassomitron@lemmy.world 9 points 2 months ago

Thanks for the detailed response. Based on this and other replies, I'll ensure to continue ignoring his videos if they ever pop up in my Recommended lists. I miss the golden age of YouTube (late 2000s/early 2010s) when awesome channels like CGP Grey, Rocket Jump, etc were able to thrive on the platform, versus nowadays where only the clickbaitiest channels flourish.

[–] VonCesaw@lemmy.world 11 points 2 months ago (1 children)

imo if he wanted to "cure blindness" he would have paid to fly the people to a country with socialized medicine (for less money than he paid to "cure" their blindness) and advocate for a system that could prevent their blindness in the first place

[–] MBM@lemmings.world 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

That's kind of fucked, forcing another country to pay for those expensive operations (and I don't think you can just do that). I agree that relying on generous millionaires is not the way to go though

[–] VonCesaw@lemmy.world 2 points 2 months ago

tbf most countries charge for foreign patients to use their system, but tbb if he was shedding a light on what a more socialized system looks like would unsour a lot of americans' view on it

personal anecdote but most of the people around me believe that all socialized medicine happens to be is waiting lines/lists, death panels, and "state-assisted death"