Vegan Youtube is Dead.

hey guys I'm just live-streaming while
doing my dishes here in my fabulous kitchen in the southern France this fabulous kitchen in fabulous apartment as matter of fact ah thought was just crossing my mind in starting up this live stream in my kitchen actually got a live stream while I'm yeah there you can see the dishes in the sink I was reminded of a time yes a couple years ago now when I tuned in to watch hennya back when hey Nia could still kind of talk to me in a relaxed way like a normal human being which she can't anymore I was kind of reflecting on that you know the overall tide of activity and the vegan YouTube demi-monde rises and falls and of course it rises and falls on other social media platforms like I was on tumblr at a time when the vegan seen within tumblr was really popping and then died i watch it die and at the moment I mean there are seasonal considerations as well generally YouTube dies down during all school holidays I think that's because a lot of my own viewers are parents so they're busy taking their kids on vacation there are there are seasonal variations but it's also true that in an absolute sense right now you know the scene is quieted down there was a time when live-streaming if I popped on hashtag vegan there'd be three or four other people live streaming at the same time talking about veganism or you know talking about their lives but they happened to be vegan whatever it was when there was a lot of action Facebook you know YouTube and of course bouncing off other you know blogging platforms Twitter or whatever and right now right now it's it's quieted down but what I was reflecting on now and just started a live stream from my kitchen and being reminded of this time when I saw any live streaming you know what doesn't calm down is the sense of of paranoia that this medium seems to instill in people and you know Hania is not the only one there are a lot of people who are afraid to talk to me and it's not because they're afraid of me you know I think they probably are people who care more about and have their feelings hurt more by YouTube comments by you know kind of anonymous internet comments than I do because I don't get my feeling so for them they're probably people who care more about courting public opinion who care more about trying to capture the hearts and minds their audience you know trying to please the crowd in short and that's understandable that's how you make your money you know for me it isn't you know but there are all kinds of reasons why that's understandable including the vulnerability to anonymous comments everything across the board but certainly in these last couple of months as you know there's been a kind of a tide that has lowered and you see pretty much old boats coming down with it across the whole scene you know one of the reasons for the tide lowering for the level of interest and engagement lowering is that what we're doing now is not new anymore and for the audience when this was new for a lot of people in the audience that were hearing these issues being discussed for the first time even if they'd been vegan for years or even if they've involved in animal rights activism with another kind for many years a lot of them you know I got messages like that directly myself there were having conversations you know face face to the people and they'd say wow I'd never heard someone debating these issues title with that issue or you know all the different real talk that had to pour out here including you know someone like Kenya talking about her own frustrations with going to street protests or you know all the all the issues surrounding being vegan once you get past the basic questions of how do I get enough b12 I don't get enough protein you know all the questions about the meaning of life and the meaning of the movement a lot of that was new and it's not new anymore it's not new for the audience and it's not new for the broadcasters it's not new for people like me right but it's sad for me to reflect that there's a sense of vulnerability that's always new and it's a vulnerability that a lot of people exhibit as a sort of paranoia [Music] you know look good this way I'd be interested in having anyone on my channel talk to me who's interested in making a positive difference in veganism in the next five years I was talking to a guy couple weeks ago now on live stream and I said to him we were having a really address discussion about real world activism Street activism city hall activism legal activist and political activism and also some of the YouTube digital demo stuff I said to him look you know can I ask your permission to record this now and put it on YouTube or can I have you back as a guest in future can we do something for you too you know and his reply was no he was afraid of being taken to court he was afraid of legal consequences and that fear you know it's not totally baseless you know I kind of know where he's coming from and there are other people who say they can't risk their professional reputation and there are other people who can't even articulate why it is that they feel that they just can't I said many times and I said a long time ago here on YouTube honesty is the only currency we've got if we can't come on camera and keep it real and talk about what's weighing down our hearts what can we do and why are we here you know I mean and I mean sure I wish you know I wish Danny and I were still in speaking terms I have no idea what she's capable of next five years for veganism but to stick with her as an example I wish I had a growing network of highly motivated highly competent people whether they're pursuing social media stardom or lobbying City Hall or doing street protests or whatever you know I was certainly hoping I was really hoping my patreon would become a crossroads for people who want to see and create a positive change I was certainly hoping my youtube channel was for me personally spark a lot of those kinds of relationships now in reality I have two three maybe four or five relationships like that that have come early Jo which I really do value which are pressures me and some of those people you know they're so you know someone like Maude vegan someone like Steven fight people have done YouTube videos with talking about being in politics and anyone at watch those videos can tell we're thinking about what kind of positive change we can make have an excuse that's great but their numbers are very finite and they can probably be be counted on on one hand and as I say my point in this video is look on the one hand of course talent is scarce do you work in any field talent is scarce but it's a shame that so much of the talent we've got remains isolated in these mutually invidious scenarios because of a kind of fear whether you think of that as a paranoia or not however you imagine that a kind of vulnerability that's always new even as we now enter this era in which this message is not new and and we see that the audience numbers we see that the audience behavior what I'm talking about my own life I never run out of material always got new stuff to talk about if it's what I'm doing this month last month next month course if it's about vlogging auto auto biographical material is new but there's no doubt you know there was a time when I talked about vivisection on this channel I had a bunch of old vegans talking to me saying it never heard the word vivisection before which is amazing to me and they never thought about those issues that never thought about scientific research and the issues with animals rotation sided resume fascinating it nourish me of that well lightning doesn't strike twice my small audience who got to know me because I opened up a lot of those issues for discussion for the first time in though in their own lives of course in a library in an archive somewhere all those issues have been discussed and debated before but they were new on this medium that were new for this audience in the internet and they were new for people who have largely discovered veganism within the last 10 years most of us in the last five years and people who have started to think about veganism as a political movement seeking broad social change not just as a diet not just as a form of personal purity because vegetarianism has been around forever but whether you know vegetarianism via Hinduism or Buddhism or some other or field the vast majority of vegetarians I was just reading the other day mr. Rogers the TV actor he was a vegetarian but he wasn't promoting or supporting vegetarian as he wasn't preaching it he wasn't pursuing a social movement it was just for his own personal private ethics his own sense of purity or what have you that's very different it's really for most of us it's just the last few years then it last ten years let's say that veganism is taking on this horizon where it's not just about you and it's not just about me and it's not just about the diet it's about ecology it's about the animals it's about the future of the planet it's about our ethics and politics on a social level on a nice level right but the excitement we had in the digital demi-monde talking about activism talk about aspersion to the future that was because for so many of us as broadcasters as aspiring activists and in the audience it was new a lot of us you know if you grew up watching normal TV and not YouTube you had you know a couple years ago maybe you'd never seen you know videos of street activists getting into dialogues with strangers about why do you eat meat what do you think about factory conditions slaughterhouse conditions here hell we've all seen it a hundred times you know maybe when you first came on YouTube you'd never seen the videos of the actual slaughterhouse conditions themselves maybe you'd never seen the horrifying videos of weird as wool come from how does the woman store there was a time for all of us when that was new because it wasn't on broadcast television and it was here on YouTube and that created a unique one-time impetus for you know this medium to be something exciting and different in our lives and to spark conversations between different broadcasters between different channels and that is good gone it's never to come back lightning doesn't strike twice and as I say it's a shame that the sense of alienation isolation and frankly to some extent you know this feeling of paranoia I I guess because ultimately people are afraid they'll be exposed though they're afraid though they'll have their feelings hurt by mean comments or you know I don't know they'll be defamed or slander somehow somehow all this will come up or they'll be dragged into court as I mentioned an example it's a shame to see a digital platform that should be a crossroads that should bring people together that should spark bigger and better and broader organization instead keeping people isolated in that way and for that reason