CoryxKeshin

IS YOUTUBE RACIST?

BY MADDEN HOLLOWAY

Popular and long-time YouTuber CoryxKenshin posted a video to YouTube on August 24th, 2022, discussing his thoughts on a situation in which one of his videos of him playing a video game was age restricted, while videos of other non-black YouTubers playing the same game were not. CoryxKenshin is a Youtuber, primarily focusing on gaming, who has been making videos for the past thirteen years and has amassed over 14 million subscribers. According to his video, he felt that he was being racially discriminated against because his video involving “The Mortuary Assistant,” a game, was flagged for being against age-restriction policies. Cory was one of many people to play that video game and he was the only one whose video was age restricted. At the time the video was flagged, Cory had returned from a four-month break from YouTube. This was not the first time a situation like this had occurred, similarly in the past he had returned after month-long breaks and YouTube had given one of his past videos some kind of violation without much explanation. Moreover, when Cory’s video was flagged for age restriction, he attempted to appeal the restriction, but he was denied. After some investigating, he realized that he was the only one of many who had been age-restricted for playing this game. When he realized this, he decided to fire back at the YouTube policy team by using this evidence in an email he sent to them and sending a non-restricted video. The YouTuber whose video he sent to the policy team, Markiplier, is around the same stature in terms of viewership and is not black. Following the email Cory sent to the policy team, YouTube decided to remove the age-restriction on his video. However, Cory was dissatisfied with this decision because he expected the video he sent to the policy team to be age restricted as well. He even says in a response video, “They used his (Markiplier’s) video to verify my innocence”.

Subsequently, Cory decided to write a lengthy email expressing his suspicion that the policy team was either favoring other YouTubers over him or were racially discriminating against him. When he sent the email to them, the YouTube policy team finally removed the age restriction on the video and it is now public for everyone to see. After this situation transpired, many other YouTubers shared similar experiences where they felt like they were discriminated against, or there was just no transparency when they received a community guideline strike.

Popular Youtuber and Twitch live streamer YourRage also shared similar experiences in a video reacting to Cory’s video. He goes into detail explaining how YouTube denies him privileges that other YouTubers usually experience. His videos often receive community guideline strikes and he is usually able to appeal them, but it is the principle of receiving a strike and there not being any transparency on why someone received it. YourRage does curse when he talks, contrary to Cory who never curses in his videos and even goes to the lengths of censoring out bad words in the games he plays, but that is not anywhere near a reason to give someone a community guideline strike, based on the actual guidelines. YouTube even has a box that everyone who uploads a video has to check off saying if it is suitable for children or not.

So why are these YouTubers and live streamers receiving age-restrictions and community guideline strikes? Is it because YouTube and other social media platforms are starting to see more black influencers arise and they don’t like it? Regardless, YouTube definitely has problems that need fixing, and people need to speak up more about similar experiences to solve them.