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Counterpoint: Garbage in Garbage out. Content creator motives, People love drama (more than usual nowadays?)
You should not try to pull much conclusions from what is being reported by in the media because what gets reported on is an extremely non random sample.
I don't know if I am the only one to notice this, but peoples hunger for drama is really high nowadays. For example in the Ned Fulmer case. Hes a popular youtuber that got into a scandal, hardly the first time that happened. But I noticed the difference this time was that the scandal blew up outside of their main audience. I saw 100's of tiktoks commenting on the situation, analyzing the event, explaining the drama to the uninitiated. The gossip networks are just that much bigger due to shortform content becoming the dominant form of media. Short form videos are like tweets which are already GREAT at spreading drama but even more appealing to the masses. So many creators are talking about this and getting in on the drama while the getting is good.
Noticed a similar trend with the Neimann-Carlsen scandal. So many comments in /r/chess going along the lines of "don't play chess or follow the pro scene, just here for the drama". Unsurprisingly chess streamers (a relatively new phenomenon) were fanning the flames of drama non-stop digging up dirt on Neimann, their fanbases and drama lovers from outside ate that shit up.
I would say if you think Twitter is a stain on the social fabric, you would think TikTok is antichrist. Heard of "West Elm Caleb"? In short; a random guy from NYC ghosted a fair number of women on online dating apps. Some random woman made a tiktok "warning" others of his shenanigans. Said tiktok went viral and many many more women who supposedly got ghosted by the same Caleb also made tiktoks about his shenanigans. Resulting in a witch hunt and doxxing of said Caleb. So girl gossip/drama -> witchunt/doxxing/probable unemployment is the new meta?
It's always been this way. Social media only makes it worse due to social signals and virality. Everything seems distilled or class or politics, whose side are you on.
Sorta like how the 24-hour-news-cycle didn't exist before 9/11 and ever since then keeps looking for the next 9/11, the social media machine is getting hungry for dramabombs after all the recent wackiness has died down.
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Yeah but I would say tiktok and other short form video content is amplifying that to a degree even those aware are not used to.
These days people are dredging drama from normies who have absolutely no power over anything.
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