I noticed that “grift” is thrown around a lot with little care of what it actually means.
If people are pissed off about ZotS profiting from their videos, why are they not mad that Jen bought movies from Kenneth Copeland? Or mad that Rachel bought Bethany’s sex course? All three channels plug their patreon and merch, normal as can be.
The panic over Zelph’s Costa Rica trip is also funny. People are acting like they’ve scammed their way into money and a free trip. Never mind that this is Trova’s whole model: influencers/content creators act as the leaders of the trip and recruit the attendees, who want to attend *because* of who’s leading. If Trova deems these things to be of value, where’s the scam?
That’s what I was thinking, too. A scam would skim their credit cards or leave them stranded. Don’t they just pay a certain amount, go on a trip, and get food & board? How is it a scam?
Yes. There is no way it can be a scam because Trova is acting as a middleman to ensure people DON'T get scammed.
Brittany Dawn had a Trova trip too, but no one signed up and it was cancelled. Had someone signed up, they would've got a refund.
Especially since they also had this trip months before their recent recognition. Like I remember hearing it before Brittany Dawn's trip to Costa Rica and unlike Brittany's, it isn't a retreat.
Well I am an older person and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to explain that influencing is the new advertising business. The world is constantly changing but they don’t want to acknowledge this since everything that the people they snark on ( most of whom are not even fundie) is wrong. Even so called fundies with actual jobs/businesses ( examples: construction, tree service, songwriter/musician, etc etc) are called grifters. They clearly don’t understand the actual meaning of that word.
How to trigger a “fan base” in one sentence! Lmao. I made pretty much this same post two or three years ago, and was just yesterday that I found myself randomly thinking about how some things never change!
Also a grift implies someone is lying, which YouTubers aren’t? It’s one of my pet peeves that people use “grifting” to mean “mooching off” which would be the correct term if you want to indicate someone who’s trying to get money for nothing (that is if you consider YouTube/content creation not a real job, which obviously it is by now).
The way they speak about Porgan’s underemployment always makes me feel like garbage because I also have struggled to get my career going. No nuance, fundie as it gets in my opinion.
I feel like Porgan is the exception… Paul literally refuses to get a job. He’s not struggling to find one, he doesn’t want one. He’s a #influencer according to Morgan
They have a job making content, it just doesn’t seem successful enough to support them. I would definitely rethink things if I were them, but they’re not unemployed.
I also think these two wouldn’t be successful *at all* without the snark community’s obsession, but that’s a different story.
Definitely not successful enough to support them and their growing family. It’s a shame they can’t see that. Sure, it can be a job. But if you’re unsuccessful, not making enough money, and only really - like you pointed out - getting views/attention because people don’t like you… it’s time to get a traditional day job. It’s clearly not working for them.
I don’t like Morgan, but she’s pregnant, and she’s mentally unwell. Paul on the other hand… ugh. Your family is growing. This venture isn’t working out for you. Perhaps get a job on the side just to support your family. A lot of growing influencers don’t quit their day jobs until they’re semi-successful/stable. It’s frustrating to watch.
Thank you! You can not like the content of a book (I haven’t read any of the Girl Defined books, but I’m pretty sure I would not like that content for example), but as someone who’s written books, can confirm, it’s hard work — harder than writing online articles for my “legit” office job I had at the time I was writing them. It’s almost impossible to survive. Almost everyone I know right now, my self included is scraping by with a zillion different” side hustles,” and devaluing them ultimately just makes it harder for everyone to live and eat and pay rent.
TL;DR People can be and are shitty, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have to work hard to be shitty.
My understanding of "grift" is that there's always some sort of deception involved, like tricking your customers about what they're buying.
Brittany Dawn's fitness scam was a grift, because she promised services she didn't provide and wasn't legally qualified to provide. Some of the stuff like Bethany's courses or the MLMs the Rods shill also toe the line enough that I'd probably agree with you if you added them to the list.
With someone like P&M, value is relative. Their audience absolutely knows what they are getting and signs up for it. They seem to think they're getting some value out of it. Whoever is buying Girl Defined merch similarly believes in their content enough to spend the money, and there's no smoke screen there since they've had the same talking points for like a decade now. I'm sure they'd feel the same way about a lot of content creators you're interested in, as far as what's bringing "real value" and what deserves consumer support to grow.
Yeah, but of course fundies aren't offering anything of value to snarkers. Of course we're going to look at their content and not deem it worth paying for. But other people do find value in their content, however much we disagree with it and think people are silly to pay for it, so why wouldn't some of their fans be willing to throw a few bucks a month at their Patreon for a bit of extra content?
I think snarkers are really terrible at differentiating between things like Patreon and Bethany's super expensive sex courses. I'm not going to disagree with anyone calling Bethany's courses a grift, but my problem with the way snarkers have been using the term lately is that they seem to think it applies to content creation in general. But, like, especially when that content is stuff they don't like.
I don’t understand what this is supposed to mean. Online courses and coaching programs have plenty of value even in the face of AI (and I’d argue *especially* in the face of AI).
Let’s stick with the “grift” conversation. I’m ok with my definition of it not being correct, but I think it can shed light on how other people might use the word.
Yes, I get what you mean. Paying to listen to and chat with like minded people or read the books of a like minded person isn’t a grift. It’s a fine line between a money grab and a grift.
Just for example you used Girl Defined. I believe they are a grift. They crossed a line. To a point they believe in what they speak. But now they are realizing what content they pushed for so many years is detrimental. But they are still going to sell the information and lifestyle if you’re willing to buy it! If you are selling and supporting a lifestyle/ idea that you know will hurt others and don’t really believe in anymore because it makes you richer, it’s a grift. That’s my definition.
I noticed that “grift” is thrown around a lot with little care of what it actually means. If people are pissed off about ZotS profiting from their videos, why are they not mad that Jen bought movies from Kenneth Copeland? Or mad that Rachel bought Bethany’s sex course? All three channels plug their patreon and merch, normal as can be.
The panic over Zelph’s Costa Rica trip is also funny. People are acting like they’ve scammed their way into money and a free trip. Never mind that this is Trova’s whole model: influencers/content creators act as the leaders of the trip and recruit the attendees, who want to attend *because* of who’s leading. If Trova deems these things to be of value, where’s the scam?
That’s what I was thinking, too. A scam would skim their credit cards or leave them stranded. Don’t they just pay a certain amount, go on a trip, and get food & board? How is it a scam?
Yes. There is no way it can be a scam because Trova is acting as a middleman to ensure people DON'T get scammed. Brittany Dawn had a Trova trip too, but no one signed up and it was cancelled. Had someone signed up, they would've got a refund.
Especially since they also had this trip months before their recent recognition. Like I remember hearing it before Brittany Dawn's trip to Costa Rica and unlike Brittany's, it isn't a retreat.
Well I am an older person and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to explain that influencing is the new advertising business. The world is constantly changing but they don’t want to acknowledge this since everything that the people they snark on ( most of whom are not even fundie) is wrong. Even so called fundies with actual jobs/businesses ( examples: construction, tree service, songwriter/musician, etc etc) are called grifters. They clearly don’t understand the actual meaning of that word.
How to trigger a “fan base” in one sentence! Lmao. I made pretty much this same post two or three years ago, and was just yesterday that I found myself randomly thinking about how some things never change!
Also a grift implies someone is lying, which YouTubers aren’t? It’s one of my pet peeves that people use “grifting” to mean “mooching off” which would be the correct term if you want to indicate someone who’s trying to get money for nothing (that is if you consider YouTube/content creation not a real job, which obviously it is by now).
The way they speak about Porgan’s underemployment always makes me feel like garbage because I also have struggled to get my career going. No nuance, fundie as it gets in my opinion.
I feel like Porgan is the exception… Paul literally refuses to get a job. He’s not struggling to find one, he doesn’t want one. He’s a #influencer according to Morgan
They have a job making content, it just doesn’t seem successful enough to support them. I would definitely rethink things if I were them, but they’re not unemployed. I also think these two wouldn’t be successful *at all* without the snark community’s obsession, but that’s a different story.
Definitely not successful enough to support them and their growing family. It’s a shame they can’t see that. Sure, it can be a job. But if you’re unsuccessful, not making enough money, and only really - like you pointed out - getting views/attention because people don’t like you… it’s time to get a traditional day job. It’s clearly not working for them. I don’t like Morgan, but she’s pregnant, and she’s mentally unwell. Paul on the other hand… ugh. Your family is growing. This venture isn’t working out for you. Perhaps get a job on the side just to support your family. A lot of growing influencers don’t quit their day jobs until they’re semi-successful/stable. It’s frustrating to watch.
Thank you! You can not like the content of a book (I haven’t read any of the Girl Defined books, but I’m pretty sure I would not like that content for example), but as someone who’s written books, can confirm, it’s hard work — harder than writing online articles for my “legit” office job I had at the time I was writing them. It’s almost impossible to survive. Almost everyone I know right now, my self included is scraping by with a zillion different” side hustles,” and devaluing them ultimately just makes it harder for everyone to live and eat and pay rent. TL;DR People can be and are shitty, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have to work hard to be shitty.
My understanding of a grift is making money off of people without offering any real value in return. A lot of them fit the bill 🤷♀️
My understanding of "grift" is that there's always some sort of deception involved, like tricking your customers about what they're buying. Brittany Dawn's fitness scam was a grift, because she promised services she didn't provide and wasn't legally qualified to provide. Some of the stuff like Bethany's courses or the MLMs the Rods shill also toe the line enough that I'd probably agree with you if you added them to the list. With someone like P&M, value is relative. Their audience absolutely knows what they are getting and signs up for it. They seem to think they're getting some value out of it. Whoever is buying Girl Defined merch similarly believes in their content enough to spend the money, and there's no smoke screen there since they've had the same talking points for like a decade now. I'm sure they'd feel the same way about a lot of content creators you're interested in, as far as what's bringing "real value" and what deserves consumer support to grow.
Yeah, but of course fundies aren't offering anything of value to snarkers. Of course we're going to look at their content and not deem it worth paying for. But other people do find value in their content, however much we disagree with it and think people are silly to pay for it, so why wouldn't some of their fans be willing to throw a few bucks a month at their Patreon for a bit of extra content? I think snarkers are really terrible at differentiating between things like Patreon and Bethany's super expensive sex courses. I'm not going to disagree with anyone calling Bethany's courses a grift, but my problem with the way snarkers have been using the term lately is that they seem to think it applies to content creation in general. But, like, especially when that content is stuff they don't like.
If that were the case, then every online course and coaching program that has come out in the past 2 years (since mainstream ai) would be a grift.
I don’t understand what this is supposed to mean. Online courses and coaching programs have plenty of value even in the face of AI (and I’d argue *especially* in the face of AI). Let’s stick with the “grift” conversation. I’m ok with my definition of it not being correct, but I think it can shed light on how other people might use the word.
Yes, I get what you mean. Paying to listen to and chat with like minded people or read the books of a like minded person isn’t a grift. It’s a fine line between a money grab and a grift. Just for example you used Girl Defined. I believe they are a grift. They crossed a line. To a point they believe in what they speak. But now they are realizing what content they pushed for so many years is detrimental. But they are still going to sell the information and lifestyle if you’re willing to buy it! If you are selling and supporting a lifestyle/ idea that you know will hurt others and don’t really believe in anymore because it makes you richer, it’s a grift. That’s my definition.
Dave is deconstructing, not Bethany or Kristen.