Parasocial Subscriber FREAKS Out + WIP Speedpaint

[00:00:00]Story time on how I had to block one of my longest standing supporters because they developed a parasocial relationship with me or connection with me and would not leave me alone no matter how many clear expectations I tried to set, no matter how kind I tried to be. And I eventually had to block them. And when I blocked them, they absolutely lost their minds and did a complete 180 and have been the most hateful, nasty person known to man. And there's a lot to talk about because this situation isn't something that happened over the span of a week. This is something that has slowly been building behind the scenes for months. And I have tried reaching out or trying to set clear boundaries and just nothing was working. And I got to a point where I was starting to feel unsafe and just very uncomfortable. And so I set these boundaries and I thought because a lot of you guys also create content that this could be a good learning opportunity for how to stay safe online and also just kind of how to handle these situations cuz they can be very confusing on how to handle cuz at the day this is somebody who's supporting you. So you don't want to hurt their feelings but also you have to respect your boundaries and your safety and not allow people to encroach on your space which is exactly what this person was doing. Now, in the background of this video, I am going to be drawing a one of your guys' avatars. Now, a lot of you guys have asked that I try jelly style, and I'm going to be honest, I have been avoiding doing jelly style for as long as I've done digital art, mainly just because it is so hard to get right.

[00:01:09]The proportions, as well as just the overall shading is so tricky, and so I try my best. It's my very first attempt at jelly style. Let me know if you have any tips. Um, the drawing is about 70% done. And I actually started this a couple weeks ago, so I am actively using Procreate in this. I got all your guys' requests or suggestions to use other softwares and I've looked into them.

[00:01:27]However, I do have a lot of brushes. I'd say I think it's about 400 custom brushes in my Procreate. I can maybe show like a video of me scrolling through them. I have a ton a ton of brushes including pose packs and things like that that I bought for like referencing and studying things like that. And unfortunately, it looks like a lot of the other softwares or drawing apps don't necessarily have compatibility with Procreate brushes.

[00:01:46]And so, I'm not super eager to leave behind the hundreds of dollars that I spent on these custom brushes and things like that. So, with that in mind, I will be looking into actually just like basically joining myself in a Discord call from my iPad while I draw and then mirroring it to my computer and recording on OBS so that way it's able to record like a more in-depth time-lapse, I guess, if that makes sense. So, I'm going to try that. You guys can let me know what you think. But for this one, this one I started weeks ago. I've been working on it kind of on the side. So, this is the time lapse that I have. And then my next story every time I'll be doing I'll try out the mirroring version. and you guys can let me know what you think before I potentially switch to a whole other platform because I just don't want to leave behind all my brushes. Maybe I'm I got some emotional attachment to them.

[00:02:23]My bad. But anyways, with that all out of the way, let's get started. Now, because this is like a parasocial kind of behavior, I'm not going to be mentioning this person's name because I know it will just make it worse. And at the end of the day, I know maybe not everybody would know what parasociality means or what that entails, but essentially it's behaviors that can happen online where somebody develops a one-sided relationship with you. And I'm not talking about a romantic relationship. It could be a friendship.

[00:02:46]It could be thinking that you're comrades or things like that. But essentially, it's when somebody online with very little, you know, you interacting, you barely interact, develops a sort of understanding in their mind that you guys are friends or that you guys are on some other level compared to other people who watch your content. And essentially means that they believe that you guys have a sort of relationship when you as a creator or the other person on the end of that are not aware of this. Okay? And because of that, these people will often times demand access to you, demand that you respond to them over other people, demand certain things, and basically they just want special treatment because in their mind, they've created this sort of, I guess, illusion or reality where you guys are best friends and you just aren't aware of that yet. Now, this is not something that's only happened with this one individual. It's happened actually with a variety of people, but this one situation is the one that I think is the most extreme and hence why I want to make a story time about it.

[00:03:33]So, essentially, this all started about I think like seven or eight months ago.

[00:03:38]Um, but essentially what ended up happening was I was posting videos on YouTube. And at the time I maybe had 8,000 subscribers. So I wasn't massive, but I had some subscribers. And I began to notice that there was this one person that was always commenting on my videos every single day. And I want to be clear, there is a group of people, like a handful that I can think of off the top of my head that comment on my videos every day who have been very kind, very appropriate, and always, you know, art is very nice. You know what I mean? So I'm definitely not speaking about those people. And it's it's really inspiring, I guess, when you see the same people coming back every day to support you.

[00:04:08]And I really do appreciate that. Now, this one person started off like those people. They're very kind, very supportive. And they were leaving comments every day like, "Hey, Pommy, love the video. Hey, this is awesome.

[00:04:17]Hey, this is cool. This is amazing."

[00:04:18]Right? And it was really kind. And I do my best to respond all the comments, but also at the end of the day, there will be videos where they get a ton of comments. And typically, I only respond to the first couple that come out before I close YouTube and go and live my life, you know, outside of the computer. So, essentially, I was responding to comments. And after a couple weeks, I'd say between three and four weeks, I began to notice that their tone started to shift. and the tone wasn't nasty or rude. However, the tone was kind of like a victim like victimizing themselves where they would frequently leave comments being like, "Hey Pomi, I commented yesterday and you didn't respond or hey, you've been ignoring me.

[00:04:49]Why are you ignoring me?" And that's a comment that I find is like a red flag for parasocial behaviors when people say, "Why are you ignoring me?" Because I'm not purposely ignoring anybody. But also, I'm not going to spend my whole day on YouTube looking through all my comments, refreshing my YouTube studio every 5 minutes. Especially if you left a comment like maybe 5 hours ago, and now you're saying that I'm ignoring you.

[00:05:06]It's been 5 hours. I'm doing stuff. I'm sorry. You know what I mean? So, they started leaving comments like, "Why are you ignoring me?" And then they would start writing paragraphs about their day, which I'm all cool to learn about your guys' day. A lot of times you guys be like, "Oh, I'm eating this while I'm watching your video." Or, "Oh, I had this go on today." Or, "Happy birthday."

[00:05:20]You know, things like that, right?

[00:05:22]Totally normal. However, this person would leave these very, very detailed descriptions of what they did in day and they would ask me for a description of what I did back. And the issue was a lot of the stuff that they were sharing was basically just identifiable. They'd say, "I went to this store and then I went to this and then I did this and then I did this with my friend and then I went to school." And they were listing areas and stores and things like that that are very specific to their location, like small businesses, stores that you wouldn't find in like a major city, things like that. So, to me, that was a security concern. And so, I wouldn't interact with it because I don't want to engage with somebody that's actually potentially putting themselves in harm's way. You know what I mean? It's not my job to lecture you on internet safety, but also I can kind of do my due diligence as a creator and remove your comments when you're basically doxing yourself or just not interact with it.

[00:06:01]You know what I mean? So, I advise my channel manager to basically anytime they mention something about their location, please just take it down. I don't need this person like basically telling everybody where they live. And they caught on that I was removing comments or my channel manager was when they be sharing personal information.

[00:06:16]And they wrote a very long comment basically getting upset and saying, "Why are you remove my comments?" To which I responded and said, "Hey, I think issue safety is really important." Which you guys can find these comments if you go back to my older videos, you will find them. Um, and I'm like, "Hey, I think issue safety is really important. I just wanted you to be aware that the stuff you're posting does kind of indicate where you are in the world and I'm not comfortable having that on my channel, you know, blah blah blah. You choose to do on your own social media is your choice, but I just don't feel comfortable with this. Thanks. [music] And they're like, okay, I'm sorry. And so I thought everything was fine, right?

[00:06:41]And they keep leaving comments on my videos. And still these comments are a little bit, why didn't you respond to me? You're making me sad. These kind of things, which I thought maybe this is just someone who was really excited or maybe didn't quite understand social cues. I don't know because you never know who's behind the screen, right? And so whatever. Time goes on. and I'm posting videos and I kind of take a step back from responding to comments because there's just been a ton of comments. I don't necessarily have the time for it.

[00:07:02]I've been in school, things like that.

[00:07:03]Not that I'm above it, but you know, school comes before anything else.

[00:07:05]That's just my opinion. So, I had to focus on school and so I wasn't online as much as I could be. So, whatever. I'm not really paying attention. And then I get a message from my channel manager that says, "Hey, Pommy. Um, you know, I've come across a variety of these comments from this one user and I think they're a little bit concerning. Do you want to go ahead and take a look at these and tell me what you want me to do?" Because the manager will never take things down unless you know, they check with me first. I'm like, "Yeah, if someone told me to kill myself, obviously take it down." But, you know, basically, they were just trying to check to make sure what they wanted what I wanted them to do. And I look at the comment. It was basically this person saying like, "I've really hurt them and they would appreciate an apology from me." And I was like, "What? Like, what is going on here?" And they went ahead to YouTube Studio and searched by this specific username. And you could see there was like dozens, like so many comments from this person saying like, "Notice me, answer me, pal me. Why aren't you answering me? Why are you ignoring me? You're making me upset.

[00:07:54]You've hurt my feelings. I cried today because you didn't respond to me. Just basically being really really creepy.

[00:07:58]Okay. And I just told my channel manager, can you please just take that comment down? I'm not going to interact with it. You know, at the end of the day, I don't know what they want me to do, but I I can't be what they want me to be like their best friend. I don't know. Some sort of like mental health support. That's not my place. I'm sorry.

[00:08:12]So, I don't know. So, I just kind of left it alone and just said, "Can you please take that comment down? I'm not going to interact with this." Then, a couple weeks after that, I start to notice that the comments being left by the specific individual are becoming less nice. [music] um they're not mean per se, but basically I could say in my video, "The sky is blue." And they go, "Actually, the sky is more of a like a gray actually today." Um so that's misinformation.

[00:08:33]Or I could say, "Oh, at a stop sign, you're intended to stop." And they be like, "Well, actually, technically, if you can do a rolling stop, so it's kind of a yield depending on if you're like basically just like anything that I would say, any statement that I would make, and it could be the most blanket basic statement note to man. Hey, we should treat everybody with respect."

[00:08:49]They'd be like, "Well, you know, respect is kind of a difficult term to identify like things like that. They just try and like argue with absolutely everything that I said. And I find that a lot of times if people try to do this, it's for attention. They want me to respond to them and they think saying nice things instead isn't making me a response, so they'll just try to argue with me in the comments, which I don't have time to argue in the comments. I don't think most people do, whatever, right? And so I start to notice this kind of shift in their behavior where they're now becoming a little bit more critical, I guess, which, you know, criticism is something that I welcome on my channel, especially if it's rooted in factual information, emphasis on factual information. But at this point, it was just kind of someone trying to take my words out of context or try to skew the messaging that I was trying to portray in my video. And so I was just like, "That's kind of weird." And I just didn't interact with them. And I think them leaving these comments of basically trying to start an argue with me. And me not responding was just further making them upset. And they started leaving more comments like, "Oh, you can't take the heat. You can't you you don't want to respond to my comment cuz you know I'm right." And I actually did end up responding, which I shouldn't have. I shouldn't have. I just said, "Hey, not sure where you're getting this idea from. I don't feel the need to argue in the comments. You're welcome to have your opinions." And that's just all I said. You again, if you go back at my channel, you go to my older videos, you will see these conversations. You will see them. But anyways, so that I thought that was that. Okay, you're welcome to have your opinion, whatever. Then [music] um like many times, there is a whole thread made about me on Twitter. And this person surprisingly is like one of the main perpetrators, I guess that's what you want to call it, of this thread where the thread is completely made up.

[00:10:11]It's not true. People in this thread are actively saying I'm the reincarnation of the mustache man from Germany. um things like that, like just the most outlandish crazy things. And this person is at the forefront of this conversation being like, "Oh my god, yeah, like I spoke I spoke to Pommy and yeah, she like she does this and yeah, she does that and I knew her personally and this this this and this." Keep in mind the only interactions we've ever had has been on YouTube comments and this person basically just telling me their whole life story when I didn't ask for it. Not in a mean way, but this is very much a one-sided fictional relationship. I do not know this person. I am not friends with them. I've never spoken to them privately. And they're basically going on and on and on on Twitter about how they know me, about how I have these opinions about certain people, which I've never spoken to anybody about and I don't even know what people are talking about. Things like that. Basically trying to position themselves in a place where they're an expert on what's happening and they somehow know behind the scenes and they're actively feeding people who don't like me misinformation about me to stir the pot. Okay. So, at this point, I've tried having conversations with them. I've tried to set boundaries in my comment sections.

[00:11:08]I've tried to be like, "Yeah, you can disagree with me." And now because they're not getting the attention I guess they want from me or the access that they think they are owed to me as a creator, they are upset and they're basically just going on a social media rampage. Okay, fine. So what do I do? I block them because I've tried having a conversation. I've tried, you know, being kind and that's not working. So I'm just going to block you because clearly my existence is bugging you. I don't want you to be in distress. I don't want you to be upset. So why not just remove myself from the situation so you don't have to think about me? Easy peasy, right? because at this point it's kind of an obsession and I'm trying to help you set boundaries because you're incapable of doing that. So here you go.

[00:11:41]Don't don't talk to me. You don't have to look at my stuff. You won't even see my videos, my tweets, whatever. Right?

[00:11:46]No. That next morning I wake up to my YouTube studio being spammed. Like someone has there this happens actually quite a bit which I'm surprised by. But people will pay for people to come and bought the channel with comments and the comments will all just say the exact same thing. And this person had done that and had went I don't know how much money they paid. I'm like this is such a waste of money. Like why are you spending your money on this? where they pay to get comments bought by it being like, [music] "Why would you, you know, why would you block this person? You're a bully. You're a bully. You're a bully." And I'm like, "What is even going on here?" And there was hundreds of these comments. Now, thankfully, YouTube Studio or YouTube as a whole has some pretty good detection for spam, especially when people are spamming hundreds of comments. So, hate to break it to you, but YouTube autoh held all of those comments so they were never seen because it thought it was spam. So, you wasted all your money. That sucks. But anyway, so I just clicked one button and said, "Yeah, don't approve those. Those are not going to go on the channel." And so now I'm like, "Okay, this is a little bit creepy because they're actually spending money to try and spam my channel with like mean things. That's weird." And I go and I realize that they've made a spam account on Twitter and are commenting under all my posts.

[00:12:43]Um, how could you do this to me? You know, I I adored your content. I was your biggest supporter. Blah blah blah.

[00:12:49]Like you've hurt my feelings. Like all this sort of stuff. And basically saying like it's all of this is because I didn't appreciate them as a supporter.

[00:12:57]which I think it's very bizarre to expect unlimited access or unfiltered access to someone online because at the end of the day I know it's hard to believe but Pomi is a fictional character I created online. It's someone that I use as a front to talk about things but it's not me. You know, there's things that I talk about as Pommy that I wouldn't talk about in real life because it just doesn't identify with who I am in real life. But at the same time, I think it's very bizarre when people act like they have some sort of right to a creator or right to be in a creator space to be speaking to somebody. Not that I think that I'm above anybody or anything like that, but it's like having boundaries or having clear expectations of what you think is appropriate versus inappropriate is really important. And when someone tries to push your boundaries, that's a major red flag that that person doesn't respect you as a person and rather thinks of you as some social media personality that needs to bend their every accommodate them because you're there to entertain them. And so essentially, I just kind of block their spam account they mean on Twitter and move on. And I'm quick to block on Twitter. I used to be, but now I just don't have a tolerance for it. So I'll just block people, move on. Whatever.

[00:13:51]GG, go next. And what ends up happening, which is actually quite interesting, is I don't hear anything for a couple months. I don't I it kind of goes silent for a little bit and I don't hear anything. And then with the recent stuff that's happened, oh my goodness, this person was at the forefront of everything. Every single thing they could comment on, every single thing they could repost, basically trying to share their sequence of events or their version of the story, how we were best friends, we were so close, we hung out every day, and it ended up being that I betrayed them and I blocked them when I got subscribers and all this and that.

[00:14:19]like genuinely a completely fabricated story that never happened. Like a story that is completely untrue and I was just like jaw on the floor. I'm like what is wrong with this person and I get it. You know, mental health is something that's heavily stigmatized. And I'm not trying to stigmatize it further or make fun of anybody. But genuinely from my heart of hearts, I think this person has a mental health condition and they need to seek help because this kind of behavior, this kind of like fantasization or like making things up a false reality is so disturbing. And honestly, I feel like poses a risk to a lot of people online.

[00:14:48]And I've doubt in the first person this person has done this to. And trust, if you go to my previous videos, you will see this person's comments. Like they are absolutely all over there. But generally, it is really concerning when people take things to such an extreme.

[00:14:58]And for what reason, I don't quite know.

[00:15:00]I think at the end of the day, it really does have to do with mental health. And I understand that a lot of areas in the world don't have adequate access to mental health supports, therapists, things like that, medications even. So, I'm not trying to make fun of anybody, but I think the moral of the story is that if you have somebody who's being really inappropriate, parasocial, who's pushing your boundaries and doesn't respect your boundaries as a person or creator, I think the best thing to do is to block them. And although that seemed to really agitate this person and make them quite upset, I still think to this day it was the right decision and it was the right decision for me and my safety.

[00:15:26]And at the end of the day, I don't think you should put yourself in a position where you're being victimized or bullied by somebody because you won't do what they want. I think that's really inappropriate, really unhealthy. And at the end of the day, you have to protect yourself and your safety. And if blocking somebody is a way to do that, then you got to do that. You know what I mean? So, with that in mind, that's also why it's really important to not share a ton of personal details online because you share little bits of information.

[00:15:45]You may think it's, you know, not that important that you say, "Oh, I live 5 minutes away from this store or I I just walked over to this grocery store the other day." And although that may not seem super identifying, someone like this who is genuinely like depicting stalker like behavior, who has this parasocial relationship to you, will piece together those tiny little bits of information and will actually be able to develop a full picture of where you live, what stuff is near you, potentially what city you live in, what neighborhood, things like that, which is super creepy. And thankfully, that's why I don't share any like identifiable information. I'd encourage you guys not to do so either. There's a lot of trends with show your hair, do a face reveal on Roblox. Don't do that, babe. Especially if you have somebody who is potentially stalking you or if you you know with if your intention is to become a creator or a larger creator, don't do that because it's not worth your safety. So with that in mind, let me know your thoughts down below and I will see you guys next time.

[00:16:32]Bye-bye.