Capri Scarcelli, Managing Editor; Rachel Casper, Sports Editor; Kaiden Ciongoli and Tony Zona, Staff Writers

     YouTuber Logan Paul caused major controversy recently with his vlog of a dead body in Japan’s Aokigahara forest, otherwise known as “Suicide Forest.”  

    The “Sea of Trees,” located by Mount Fuji, is the world’s second most popular location for suicides, with over 105 bodies discovered in 2003, according to atlasobscura.com.

    The video, intended to be ‘humorous’ according to Paul, was posted to YouTube on Dec. 31, though he did not take it down until the following day.

    Criticism from media forced Paul to post a written apology in defense of his actions on his social media pages, later posting an apology video in tears.

    His vlog was viewed millions of times before taken down, as it was shown in the recommended page as soon as one entered the site. In fact, the video landed itself on the trending page.

    Though the original video has been removed by Paul, numerous re-uploads remain on the site as YouTube staff members frantically work to take them down.

    Paul’s apology video hit the trending page as well. This video has also been monetized, meaning that the YouTuber made profit off of it.

    A range of students at P-T have been aware of this video and said that it made them feel uncomfortable.

    Senior Olivia Printz said, “It is disturbing that he put a dead person on the internet and had zero remorse and was making jokes relating to the issue.”

Freshman Allie Prady shared a similar sentiment, saying that Paul should have made a better decision before uploading the video.

    “It bothers me that he was making jokes about it and how he actually showed the body,” Prady explained. “He should have thought before he uploaded it because he did edit the video before uploading it so he should have changed it.”

    Senior Maddy Haberberger said the situation was disgraceful, especially since it was intended to bring Paul more publicity.

    “Suicide is not something that people should ever joke about, and the fact that someone would prey on suicide victims to get views on YouTube makes me sick,” Haberberger said. “What makes me even sicker is that although he didn’t monetize the video of the suicide forest, he monetized his heavily-anticipated apology video, so that he was making a profit off of someone’s death.”

    According to The Independent, Google has announced that it will now have closer regulation of its YouTube Partner Program, which allows users to gain a portion of the profit from ads that appear before uploaded videos. A YouTuber who posts 10-minute videos weekly would have to have 1,000 subscribers and an average of 462 views per video in order to have their uploaded content monetized.

    Prior to this notion, YouTube responded in a series of tweets condemning Paul’s actions, but took no real action themselves until two weeks after the incident. Paul has officially been taken off of two major projects as of Jan. 13: a YouTube original movie, The Thinning (which was set to release a sequel), and season four of the YouTube Red series “Foursome.”

    Although YouTube has put these projects aside and cut 50 percent of ad revenue, they still expect Paul to return.

     “The most important thing to focus on is that actions speak louder than words and Logan has the opportunity to prove that,” said Robert Kyncl, chief business officer at YouTube.

    This is not the first time YouTube turned a blind eye to a YouTuber’s unconscious actions.

    Felix Kjellberg, or Pewdiepie as he is better known, went under flak in the later part of 2017 for having an “anti-semitic” sense of humor. Despite backlash from the internet, Pewdiepie remains top of the charts in subscribers with 50 million.

    Some YouTubers and celebrities are appalled by the actions of Paul. YouTuber Sean William McLoughlin, also known as Jacksepticeye, held a charity blog Jan. 7 to raise money for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. The stream, which featured McLoughlin playing video games, raised $225,000 dollars, smashing the original $50,000 goal.

     McLoughlin commented that he wanted to “make something positive out of all the bad going around lately.”

    He managed to not direct attention toward Paul, but more so the “bad culture” YouTube seems to be showing, according to McLoughlin.

    Other celebrities and YouTubers took direct shots at Paul. Ethan Dolan, Chrissy Teigen, Alisha Marie and Steven Jay Williams all made public denouncements of Paul.

    This is not the first serious incident that happened on Youtube in 2017.  In June, a woman shot and killed her boyfriend during a YouTube stunt to acclaim more subscribers.  The stunt comprised of an act where the woman was to shoot the man who had a book covering his chest.

    They thought the book would block the bullet, but instead the bullet struck the man in the chest, causing his death.  She is now serving a sentence for second degree manslaughter.

    P-T students have suggestions to help prevent something like this from happening again.

    Haberberger suggested that the YouTube administration should be more aware of what is being posted on the site.

    “YouTube already has some content restrictions, but they are not very well monitored or enforced. This video was trending no. 1 on YouTube for hours before it was taken down, meaning that anyone who visited the site was directed to the video of a lifeless body hanging in the woods and a group of people laughing at it,” said Haberberger. “I think it’s very important that the people who are in charge of YouTube pay more attention to what is being posted on the site, not only by well-known accounts but by anyone posting videos.”