YouTube's weirdest corners
Daily media consumption has become an integral part of our lives. In the past decade, we've moved from consuming traditional to more digital media; cable TV rolled over into irrelevance as YouTube entered into more and more homes with the mass availability of faster internet.
YouTube has slowly become a staple of our lives, even in Bangladesh. Whether we're watching regular YouTubers or just watching random content, the overall result is that we spend a significant amount of our day on the site or app.
While we're familiar with a lot of what YouTube has to offer, there is still an ocean of content out there, some of which might be considered "weird" by the general user, which targets quite a niche audience.
Therefore, for purely educational purposes, I present to you some of YouTube's weirdest content.
CHIROPRACTIC ASMR
The whole debate between whether chiropractors should be considered "real" doctors can wait, because chiropractors seem to have made a somewhat legit career on YouTube. While sceptics may say that chiropractic treatment yields no real health benefits (and they may just be right), it seems people still love watching other people get their spines and necks "adjusted" by chiropractors. The loud cracks caused by compression of gas bubbles in between joints is another thing the audience of such videos enjoy — as made apparent by the fan base being called "crack addicts".
EARWAX AND WHITEHEAD REMOVAL
Both of these things are generally considered to be gross. We don't like getting pimples, let alone the whiteheads that form inside them; earwax is probably what keeps the cotton buds industry running. However, it seems there's an audience out there that really loves to watch other people get their earwax or whitehead removed, that too up close. If the existence of such videos isn't enough of a shock, then the fact that they generate millions of views should be.
MUKBANG
While not a completely recent phenomenon; "mukbang" gained a lot of traction with audiences towards the start of this decade. The entire concept of mukbang is to watch another person eat in front of the camera. There's nothing more to a mukbang than a person completing, what is usually, an extravagant meal on video. Usually the character will be an attractive individual; the initial trend began with a group of Japanese girls, and has now grown to people of a variety of nationalities and ages making their own mukbang videos. Something even weirder is a new hybrid of mukbang and ASMR, where people use enhanced microphones to record themselves eating. This results in the audience being able to distinctly hear every bite, chomp, crunch, chew and so forth, and in incredible detail. And while you may be left disgusted at the thought of such a thing, mukbang plus ASMR videos get hundreds of thousands of views.
While you may question the point of knowing such "trifling" information, it can be argued that all of these genres of videos may be important to the future of the media we consume. With television now beginning to follow in the footsteps of digital media, it might not be long before you see your favourite mainstream celebrities making mukbang and ASMR videos for your viewing pleasure.
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