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We've learned nothing from Covington, apparently. Not even me.
The majority of (but not all) people reading this are likely unfamiliar with ProJared. ProJared is a prominent YouTuber and Twitch streamer that started out before YouTube and Twitch were even a thing (I think). As a second-hand gamer (I watch people play video games because they're easy entertainment, but I almost never play them myself), I enjoyed ProJared because he's got a likeable personality.
Then came the scandal. ProJared and his wife had filed for divorce with allegations of marital unfaithfulness, which is always bad for public figures. Somehow, this triggered a series of accusations on social media that I don't want to list here because they're quite horrible. The accusations went viral within certain circles, and the few people that were questioning it were shouted down.
As is routine.
There were social media posts. There were videos condemning him made by prominent YouTubers. Collaboration videos with Jared had been removed from Game Grumps to bow to the outrage mob. Jared resigned from Normal Boots and went silent. That's what guilty people do, right?
And I did the same damned thing I did during Covington. I thought "Wow, that guy's horrible." I had little evidence. I had no reason to believe that the accusations were true. If I remember right, I did have some healthy skepticism of the particularly egregious accusations, but I didn't question what his now-ex-wife had been saying. I believed an accusation with no corroborating evidence. I even made a small snarky tweet about it.
Three months pass.
As it turns out, this ain't it, chief.
The outrage mob is trigger happy. They don't need to be right. They just declare that they're right. The digital Brownshirts swarm in like locusts and destroy everything in their path.
I'm not sure if something started to make me question the narrative I'd been given or if I just thought about it one day and wondered if he'd been unfairly treated. I did some research. It turned out that everything we were being force-fed was wrong, and there were plenty of people that had already done their research. As far as marital unfaithfulness goes, Jared's wife had actually requested an "open marriage"</cringe>. So, of course he had been unfaithful-- They had mutually agreed to be unfaithful to each other. As far as the more egregious accusations go, they turned out to be simply documentable lies.
And, just today, Jared posted a video, after three months of near silence, about the accusations being made. (33 minutes in is a great place to start if you're not willing to watch the whole thing.)
But, hey, #metoo has no time for "innocent until proven guilty". We have no corrobating evidence, but let's destroy this man's life that's already in tatters from a divorce. Let's not let the legal system worry about the accusations of illegal activity. We can be our own judge, jury, and executioner.
I'll be praying for Jared, as he seems to be an emotionally fragile person that's fallen victim to outrage culture. I pray for his wife's repentance. (I am intentionally not using her name as not to encourage the already-existing different outrage mob onto her.) And I pray for the repentance of everybody that slandered Jared, as I believe that nobody is beyond redemption. I will gladly be a part of the wider community that will welcome them once they recognize that they were wrong. Recognizing that you were wrong, that you sinned against someone, and asking forgiveness is a sign of maturity that gives me a lot of respect for a person. A lot of people don't have the courage to do that. Forgiving someone that does is essential.
To be clear, Jared does a lot of things I think are horrible ideas. He ran a NSFW blog, as I understand. When fans sent him explicit photos, he should have said "No, absolutely not," even for legally-aged fans. (He did always clearly ask if they were 18+ before letting them, to be clear.) Even if you don't agree with my sexual ethic, you would probably agree that it's not a good idea for a public figure to accept pictures like that. And agreeing to an open marriage is just a horrible mistake for anyone.
That said, none of these things are anything close to constituting an internet outrage mob. Not by a longshot. He made some seriously unwise decisions, but nothing that would justify what's been done to him in response. [Update: And, as Jared rightly pointed out in his video, really none of my business or anybody else's business that isn't directly involved.] He doesn't agree with my beliefs in monogomy, but I can still get along with him. (Not personally, but only because I've never met him.)
The reason I bring this up isn't so much that I have a desire specifically to vindicate ProJared in particular (though he will be in my prayers, as will Boogie2988), but instead to simply ask-- Where will this go?
Social media has radically changed our landscape, and I'd be flat-out lying if I said it's done zero good for me. There are so many ways that it's taught me to grow. There are so many things that I've learned. I even got my current job via LinkedIn.
But we all know about this darker side. We're so trigger-happy to condemn. A careless off-color joke on Twitter is enough to cause someone to lose his or her job, whether you're a celebrity, an athlete, or a nobody. An accusation with zero evidence of something that supposedly happened decades ago can cause mobs to harass your family. Even standing awkwardly and smiling is enough to get a CNN contributor with almost 300 thousand followers to say to the entire planet to say that you have a "punchable face" and have major celebrities calling for doxxing. What the hell's going on?
The outrage mob knows no forgiveness. They know no grace. They know no mercy. They don't listen. They just want blood.
Ask not for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for thee.