MrBeast has become a viral sensation for his acts of altruism • Hacker News Board

Re: MrBeast has become a viral sensation for his acts of altruism

#261

Post by Aunche » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 5:43 AM UTC

namarie wrote: post #251

Aunche wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not exactly a fan of Mr. Beast, but this comment reeks of more elitism than any Mr. Beast video I've ever watched. Are "poors" too stupid to make decisions for themselves? Everyone in that video received thousands of dollars. I'm nowhere near poor, but if I was given an opportunity, I'd probably participate.

> Are "poors" too stupid to make decisions for themselves? Everyone in that video received thousands of dollars. I'm nowhere near poor, but if I was given an opportunity, I'd probably participate. No one's saying they're stupid for participating. If I was offered thousands of dollars for peeing in my pants in public for a video, I'd very probably take the offer and no one would think I was stupid for it; it would sti…

Why do you get to be the arbiter of what's demeaning? Are "poors" too stupid to determine their own limits? Playing silly games is hardly comparable to peeing your pants in public.

Re: MrBeast has become a viral sensation for his acts of altruism

#262

Post by andelink » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 5:46 AM UTC

seydor wrote: post #223

A lot of people seem to agree that "the end justifies the means" with his charitable acts. That's what rubs people off imo. Imagine a porn star making vids to give to charity. Would people give equal praise to her? This kind of attention-seeking is considered too easy, and too easy is usually not considered ethical. I wonder how many will imitate his deeds?

> Imagine a porn star making vids to give to charity. Would people give equal praise to her?

The only difference is the audience viewers don’t see the direct benefit of the charitable acts/contributions. I don’t see what the point of this comment/comparison is.

Re: MrBeast has become a viral sensation for his acts of altruism

#263

Post by memefrog » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 5:46 AM UTC

inconceivable wrote: post #232

memefrog wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your children aren't going to resent you because they can't watch a YouTube channel. Nobody has ever resented their parents as an adult because of something like that. My parents didn't let me watch adult-rated movies or play adult-rated games (eg The Godfather, Call of Duty) as a child, while others' parents did. You'd have to be insane to resent them for that. How far do you take this? No rules? "Sorry, no chores i…

not letting your kids watch saturday morning cartoons because you find them to be annoying seems pretty dickish and seems like it has an extremely asymmetric possible negative long run consequence. you're talking about it to this very day in a way that seems like you can't wait to enforce these rules on your own children. i can't recall a single thing my parents did along these lines. this is just not how they operat…

> not letting your kids watch saturday morning cartoons because you find them to be annoying seems pretty dickish and seems like it has an extremely asymmetric possible negative long run consequence.

What negative long run consequence could possibly be created by not being able to watch noisy, annoying, brain-mush kids TV? I'm glad I was discouraged from watching TV on a saturday morning. I didn't miss it at the time either. I did more interesting things, and half the time I had swimming lessons or sports on a Sat morning anyway.

And how is it "dickish"? It's their house. It's their TV. They paid for it, they own it, they control it. That's how the world works, and will always work, and should always work. The idea that they have some sort of obligation to put up with obnoxious screeching American cartoons is just... I don't even know what to say to that. It's just so backwards I can't even put it into words.

>you're talking about it to this very day in a way that seems like you can't wait to enforce these rules on your own children.

I brought it up because it was relevant to the conversation, It's not like I'm sitting here thinking about it all the time. I probably haven't thought about it once in the last.. 15 years?

>i can't recall a single thing my parents did along these lines. this is just not how they operated - by just laying down restriction after restriction. seems kind of shitty, honestly.

Restriction after restriction? I mentioned one thing, mate. Relax a bit please. I really don't understand your mindset though. Should parents not set boundaries? People talk all the time about how it should be parents that set boundaries for their children and not the state. Then people like you turn around and suggest that if they actually do that, they're somehow stifling their children and will breed resentment for their whole life.

>also my parents didn't teach me how to sit in front of a computer for 20 hours until i got a program to compile without errors. did they MAKE you do stuff like that? lol in fact i remember my parents complaining that i was wasting time on the internet.

Of course they didn't "teach" me how to do that, but their parenting influenced by development, because that's what parenting does.

Re: MrBeast has become a viral sensation for his acts of altruism

#264

Post by pseudalopex » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 5:46 AM UTC

freddie_mercury wrote: post #52

bitcurious wrote: post #34

Two reasons I find this distasteful. It might be a net good still, I’m not sure. It’s not obvious however. One downside is that it competes for the same “feel-good” feeling which much more effective charities compete for. Someone engages with Mr.Beast, feels like they did good. Later they walk by a food shelter in need of volunteers and thinks “I already did my part.” As we have parasocial relationships, we have para…

> One downside is that it competes for the same “feel-good” feeling which much more effective charities compete for. [...] Later they walk by a food shelter in need of volunteers and thinks “I already did my part.” The exact same argument is made against government programs. And there's a long history of research showing just how much government grants crowd out charitable giving because tax payers feel like "I alrea…

> The exact same argument is made against government programs. And there's a long history of research showing just how much government grants crowd out charitable giving because tax payers feel like "I already did my part".

How much?

> But I don't see how you can consistently argue against Mr. Beast without also arguing against government funding, if crowding out is the issue you're concerned about.

They could believe public programs and some charitable giving is more effective than no public programs and more charitable giving. Or someone who feels like a friend telling you you gave to charity affects charitable giving more.

Re: MrBeast has become a viral sensation for his acts of altruism

#265

Post by lotsoweiners » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 5:47 AM UTC

brvsft wrote: post #161

ipnon wrote: post #121

Mr. Beast has to be one of if not the most charitable YouTubers. He’s an effective altruist fever dream, curing disease and easing poverty through free entertainment. There are many worded YouTubers for the world. Perhaps it’s just his ostentatiousness that rubs people the wrong way. Do we want our saints to keep things low key?

> free entertainment It's not free. Like anything else, there is an opportunity cost for watching garbage. Mr. Beast and content-creators like him are precisely the reason my children won't have free access to YouTube if not smartphones entirely. He creates mindless garbage content that helps rots peoples' brains. Yes, plenty of other content on YouTube is no better, but this stuff actually gets marketed to people in…

My kids love Mr Beast and I have no real problem with it. I feel more comfortable with his channels than I do with some of the other crap I see them watching. I also think that it is ok for kids to get a sense of kindness and optimism from the content they consume. They have plenty of years in the future to become jaded and cynical.

Re: MrBeast has become a viral sensation for his acts of altruism

#266

Post by andelink » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 5:52 AM UTC

brvsft wrote: post #127

Invictus0 wrote: post #36

I enjoy watching Mr. Beast's videos, like millions of other people. His videos have a wonderful childlike playful energy, where contestants play schoolyardesque games for the chance of big rewards. The losers usually still walk away with thousands of dollars. He does massive amounts of philanthropy in addition to the mainstream content. Are there really any criticisms of Mr. Beast other than get-off-my-yard snobbery?

[flagged]

Wow man chill. Your aggression doesn’t belong here.

Re: MrBeast has become a viral sensation for his acts of altruism

#267

Post by guyzero » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 5:53 AM UTC

eldritch_4ier wrote: post #254

guyzero wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Mr. Beast built his channel by taking all profits from each video and plying it into the next video" To me this seems like a semi-obvious minmaxing solution to making popular videos: make essentially zero profit, regardless of revenue. At some point you get so much revenue that you can't spend it all so the next logical step is to simply give it away as part of the video. And in this case it's a virtuous cycle - app…

It’s never enough. This guy is throwing millions towards others and helping their lives, but because he’s not suffering enough to do it, or doing it out of your defined pure intentions, it’s hardly good at all? It’s clear you care more about the sacrificial theater of giving than you do about actual impact. What good have you done for anyone but yourself in the last month? Do you even fulfill your own standards? Is a…

I sleep soundly knowing Mr Beast gives less than zero shits about my opinion.

Re: MrBeast has become a viral sensation for his acts of altruism

#268

Post by ly3xqhl8g9 » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 5:55 AM UTC

chimen wrote: post #80

It's not altruism if it's your source of income. Sorry but I don't buy this bs. He's doing it to generate income, that's all. Altruism is "unselfish regard for or devotion to the welfare of others" but we have quite the opposite here - a selfish way of milking poor people for emotions in order to generate income. Real altruism is hard and done only by a few. Literally EVERY man/woman/child on this planet will say yes…

One caveat: the issue is not that someone does "philanthropy" wrong, as if they could also do it right, the issue is that a society hoping for, needing large-scale/impactful philanthropy is fundamentally unstable. In harsher words: philanthropy is a scam [1].

Instead of having a system able to detect it's pain points and be able to self-heal, our current system "solves" issues by borrowing/stealing from the future: from printing money with the velocity of an unleashed spam bot to using finite resources (wood and steel, but also energy, time, attention, expertise) to build ridiculous boats for a few billionaires.

Also, we have a better word than "large-scale/impactful philanthropy": the state. And yes, there has been and there is no state in the world, beyond all the branding and the flags of the nation-states, mainly because we are unable to solve the tragedy of the commons [2], because perhaps in order to solve it we need to develop a natura naturans [3]: how does one build a god? Because, effectively, that's what a system able to care about everyone and everything becomes.

[1] https://jacobin.com/2021/10/philanthropy-is-a-scam

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons

[3] https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/spinoza/#:~:text=This%20i...>

Re: MrBeast has become a viral sensation for his acts of altruism

#269

Post by kaba0 » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 5:58 AM UTC

blackoil wrote: post #164

paulpauper wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how sustainable this will be ultimately, but it seems like he's able to just give all this stuff away and help people, and yes, they have to agree to be being filmed participating in some manner, but seriously, he's helping folks who need it. Every day people. the federal govt. spends trillions on aid without having to film people. The whole reason Mr Beast is able to give anything away at all is because of…

Federal govt. has a right to violence to collect those trillions and they are pretty inefficient in spending it.

Because the US governments often values companies more than their own citizens. It is not a fundamental property though, Scandinavian countries do a whole lot better for example.

Re: MrBeast has become a viral sensation for his acts of altruism

#270

Post by namarie » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 6:02 AM UTC

Aunche wrote: post #261

namarie wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Are "poors" too stupid to make decisions for themselves? Everyone in that video received thousands of dollars. I'm nowhere near poor, but if I was given an opportunity, I'd probably participate. No one's saying they're stupid for participating. If I was offered thousands of dollars for peeing in my pants in public for a video, I'd very probably take the offer and no one would think I was stupid for it; it would sti…

Why do you get to be the arbiter of what's demeaning? Are "poors" too stupid to determine their own limits? Playing silly games is hardly comparable to peeing your pants in public.

Again, no one is claiming that people who participate are stupid for doing so. Why are you insisting on the idea that others see people in financial difficulty as stupid?

Nor did I say I'm the sole arbiter of what's demeaning. We both seem to agree at least that peeing oneself in public is demeaning, but some third person might not see it that way at all.