Cringe humour-based media such as cringe compilations and cringe blogs were like a better version of Tumblr's call out posts. If someone was doing something wrong in a video they made then what you would do is download their video, edit it with some other videos of people doing wrong things, and then upload it to youtube for people to laugh at. It was basically saying "you did something wrong, now you have to live with it forever as people laugh at you". It added a touch of humour to things, which explains why cringe compilations have stuck around for so long while call-out posts were only popular from 2013 to 2015.
The reason they were called Cringe Compilations was because the person was doing something so wrong that it made you cringe, but now people are making cringe videos based on whether or they agree with the person in the video's opinion. Chances are, the most cringe-worthy thing on the cringe comps would have to be the comments. You'll see twenty year olds ranting about wanting to murder a thirteen year old girl because she's going through her otaku phase. Does nobody stop and think that maybe it's wrong to humiliate people just because you disagree with them? The worst part is when you call them out on their wrong-doings, which is what they're supposed to be doing to other people, they instantly go into the "you damn offended SJW!" argument. Let me tell you, if you're upset about people calling you out then they're not the ones who are overly offended.
I mean, look at this. Did they not read over their comments before posting them, or do they actually think like this?
Yeah the whole "it's not bullying, just a joke" doesn't exactly work here. Just makes you look like an asshole.
Yeah the whole "it's not bullying, just a joke" doesn't exactly work here. Just makes you look like an asshole.
So what is a cringe comp supposed to be? How do you avoid bullying innocent people? Why are you asking this, not bullying people should be the easiest thing in the world! No don't worry, I'm joking. There's a thin line between calling someone out for doing something wrong and humiliating them because you disagree what their video is about, but it's easy to stay on the right side.
1. Leave Out Your Personal Opinions
Leave out your opinions, don't become offended if someone else makes a YouTube video expressing their own thoughts and feelings. Yes, even if it's an opinion that's popular on Tumblr.
An opinion on religion, politics, gender, sexuality, etc is not worth humiliating someone over. By doing this you are saying "you have to have the same thoughts as me or else you deserve to be bullied". Believe it or not, it makes you cringe-worthy yourself.
If their opinion is about:
- asking people to hurt someone / a group of people
( and no, someone making a video explaining bad experiences with a certain group of people is not the same thing )
- a certain type of people not being good as themselves
- how they are better than everyone else
- talking about a group/website as if it's one singular person, saying to attack that group or website because some people in there have an opinion they disagree with
- pretty much anything that is trying to hurt people or asking others to hurt people
then the video could be deemed worthy to be in a cringe compilation.
2. Understand That Your Create Your Own Audience
Like I said before, the comments are usually much worse than the cringe comp itself. And sometimes the cringe comp creators are aware of that, becoming upset that a majority of their viewers are screaming about wanting to know the address to some ten year old sonic fan so that they can murder him. There will always be those couple of people in the comment section that will be bigoted just so they can laugh at themselves for being so bigoted, thinking they're the coolest things since the invention of the fedora. Other than that, you create your own audience. If you don't want your audience to be threatening to kill people because of their opinions, then don't make your cringe comps targeting innocent people.
Another way to keep out screaming, death-threatening adults is to actually argue with comments. I don't suggest writing an entire paragraph unless the comment is a topic you're interested in that you'd like to discuss. The typical response is to say "woah, calm down" or "don't get so offended". It works especially well on those who scream and scream about people being "SJWs" just for questioning whether or not something could be sexist / homophobic / racist / etc.
Also, something to keep in mind is to make different themed cringe compilations. It can attract many different people. Stuff like "otaku cringe comp" or "furry cringe comp", although make sure to add at the start or in the description "I don't hate ___ fandom, I'm just highlighting the bad part of the fandom". Not because you think your viewers are cry babies, but because it's basic manners. Making fun of your own group or fandom is great too because it's great to laugh at your own traits once and awhile too.
3. Keep A List of People You Won't Add In A Cringe Comp
There are some people that make it okay to be cringe-worthy. I'm not saying certain minority groups, because everyone can to shitty things. I'm talking about those who can't physically or mentally control themselves or those who are not old enough to understand what they're doing.
If you know a YouTuber is mentally ill then you might want to look Ik the symptoms of their illness before downloading their video. A lot of mental illnesses result in people not being able to form sentences properly or explain their ideas without struggle. Because of this, you might misunderstand what they are trying to say in their video, so it would be smart to just avoid this.
If cringe compilations are something you only do for fun, I'd suggest just staying away from trying to add mentally ill people in your video. If you didn't know they were mentally ill then it wasn't your fault, but making fun of someone for something they can't control is a dick move. If cringe comps are a full hobby then please put some research into it!
My list of people to avoid putting in my (rarely made) cringe comp:
- people who are under the age of 16
- mentally ill people
- people who are unclear on what they're doing, just so I don't make assumptions
- obvious trolls
Yeah, you're list doesn't have to be too long.
4. Know What Counts as "So Wrong It's Cringe-Worthy"
Well you see, that can be your own personal opinion. Something as simple as someone spreading misinformation could be for you if you really wanted, but to keep viewers you should only have one or two simple cringe videos in between a clusterfuck of "I need to stop watching this, but I can't look away!".
Here's a list of examples of cringe-worthy videos:
people..
- wrecking other's property
- making a scene / distracting others in public
- thinking they're cool for mistreating others
- insulting another group of people ( especially if they claim to be for equality or if they complained about other people making fun of their group )
- encouraging bigoted or harmful acts
- harming people
- being vain about themselves while insulting others ( especially if they aren't that great in what they're being vain about, although there is a difference between confident and vain )
- being violent (smashing things, hitting people, etc) when it's not in order to protect themselves
- doing one or more of these while saying it's justified because of a group they're apart of
And example of some of these would be; a group of grown men gather in a public area to disturb people by singing the My Little Pony theme song as loud as they can, two women dress up as anime characters in public and steal people's food to "stay in character", and a woman loses in an art competition so she decides to smash her art work and scream at everyone. Yes, these are real videos.
So although you don't need to follow my specific rules, it would be nice if a couple of people actually put in effort so cringe comps don't become pathetic attempt to bully others off the internet. In the real world people can be very cruel, but there's no point in going over how you're making it even more cruel by purposely trying to be a bad person. Because we're not in the real world, we're on the Internet.
Is there a type of humour you think is beginning to become ruined? What's something funny you used to enjoy but now has become ruined? Tell me in the comments! See you guys next time!
