Would you let your daughter go to his meet and greet?

Sam Pepper has almost 2.4 million people subscribed to his YouTube channel. His Instagram account reached 870,000 followers, his Facebook 690,000 likes, and his Twitter 1.16 million followers. He has had 144 million video views on his total of 110 videos, and his most popular video reached 15.6 million views. The videos that have gotten him so popular consist mainly of pranks that Pepper believes “makes you think.” Looking at his statistics, he seems like the stereotypical popular, funny Internet Personality. Until you look at these seemingly harmless pranks’ content.

            Pepper’s last trilogy of “pranks” began with a video in which he would ask a woman for directions, and as she was responding he would surreptitiously and quickly grope her. Pepper would then reveal what he did, hug the girls, and leave. The women shown in the video are visibly shocked and confused, and of course extremely uncomfortable. This video was immediately controversial and received a lot of negative feedback, eventually being removed from YouTube altogether. Pepper then posted a video with the same premise, except with a woman approaching and groping men. This video, receiving the same negative feedback, was taken down even faster than the first. His final video, titled “The Reveal,” featured Pepper attempting to justify this series of videos as a social experiment. The YouTube community remained enraged, and Pepper garnered furious comments from not only fans but other popular YouTube creators as well.

            Since the posting of these videos, many fans who had met him either through social media or at meet and greets have come forward saying that Pepper has assaulted them, most as minors, one accusing him of rape. These girls were scared of disappointing their idol, and he abused and took advantage of the power he had over them. Sam Pepper seems like your average YouTuber, but when you look underneath the surface, you can see how revolting the content of his videos are. At what cost did those 144 million video views come at? Maybe he can make a few people laugh, but do those laughs outweigh the harm he has caused to so many people?