Davey Wavey and the hypocrisy of YouTube

When Tim Berners-Lee invented the internet, I’m sure he had no idea of the power he was about to unleash. When YouTube launched in 2005, suddenly millions of internet users were free to publish their own videos online. Whether you wished to watch a performance of Mahler’s 5th Symphony or a cute cat video, people could (within reason) view pretty much anything they wanted. With 37 million YouTube channels uploading 500 hours of content every hour, the possibilities are endless.

One channel in particular stands out. Wickydkewl has 1.3 million subscribers. Run by gay YouTuber Davey Wavey, the channel’s 750 videos cover “educational” topics “related to sex, relationships, coming out, dating, boys, homosexuality”. Great, I am all for informing the public, especially if you are struggling with something as difficult as coming out. As far as content goes, however, the problem lies in defining the concept of “educational”.

If you wish to be informed, I’m sure “stretching for gay bottoms”’is an extremely useful video for all those wishing to get a little bit more out of their love-making. His instructional video on “How to take the perfect hole pic” is no doubt a useful guide for the budding David Baileys out there. My issue here is with another video, “Real Dick vs Dildo Challenge”. The title is self-explanatory. The video has been seen two million times in less than three months.

If you don’t like the sound of Davey Wavey and wickydkewl, don’t worry, you’re not alone. Still, I am no Mary Whitehouse. As far as I am concerned, two consenting adults can do whatever they like, with whoever they like. It takes a lot to offend me. As Seymour Skinner once opined “these pants come off at night just like everybody else’s”. Either way, the video is not age-gated or 18-plus — not that it would matter. As we all know, no-one ever lies on the internet, least of all about their age.

My issue is not about offence and more to do with YouTube’s blatant double standards.

In the last quarter of 2020, YouTube removed 9.3 million videos worldwide — this includes manual and automated algorithms. Many were taken down for ridiculous reasons.

In 2019, Scott Allsop, an award-winning history teacher had his YouTube channel terminated because his GCSE tutorial videos featured footage of Adolf Hitler. The channel was later reinstated, but the message was clear — ban first, think later. More recently, lockdown sceptics and voices critical of excessive state regulation have lost their channels. A video by the eminent British oncologist Professor Karol Sikora was banned. Dr Knut Wittkowski, an epidemiologist and staunch critic of Covid-19  had a video questioning the lockdown removed. The video in question had been viewed 1.3 million times, almost as many as the “dildo” one. When it came to their removal, they all received the same abstract and impersonal response — that they violated “community guideline standards”.

In order to have your work monetised (funded by advertisements) you have to remove all potentially offensive content. Content creators wishing to make a living from YouTube have to rigorously censor themselves. That goes for edgy, spicy jokes and anything else deemed “hateful”. While these content creators have to tread a regulatory minefield in order to get their videos funded, it would appear others, like wickydkewl, can generate revenue by promoting and selling their own products in their videos. According to YouTube

a violation of the terms of service occurs when you show content “using otherwise everyday objects or scenarios…for the purpose of sexual gratification.”

We live in censorious times. The overriding rationale for the erosion of free expression appears to be some ambiguous and subjective definition of offence. In the UK, on average, 3,000 people are arrested annually for posting “offensive” material online. This was set in motion with the 2003 Communications Act, Section 127 of which makes it a crime to send grossly offensive material online. Notoriously, it led to the arrest of Count Dankula — a YouTuber who posted a video of his dog supposedly performing a Nazi salute.

Where else can your average run of the mill content creator go? YouTube is the biggest online video platform in the world — operating with a market reach of 90 per cent in the United States. This means it has near monopoly power. Its app comes pre-installed on every Android smartphone. Smaller “alt tech” video hosting sites such as BitChute are a potential solution, but their reach is far smaller. Plus, the BitChute is regularly targeted by groups like Hope Not Hate who once claimed the streaming site was “platforming hate and terror” in the UK. Contrary to what some may think, BitChute is not the Wild West — it still removes violent and sexually explicit underage content; it just has a far simpler, laissez-faire terms of service.

YouTube is acting like a hypocritical, paternalistic, self-regulating behemoth. Either all of these videos are allowed or none of them are.

The easiest solution would be to put wickydkewl’s “dildo” video on PornHub or one of many other adult sites. Somehow, I feel YouTube and wickydkewl will not listen. And no, I am not going to go check PornHub to see if it is on there.

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