British YouTube star, Sam Pepper, is notorious for his prank videos on YouTube. His videos have helped his channel gain over 2 million subscribers. However, his most recent prank video has brought him a lot of negative attention. On September 20^th, he posted a video of himself walking around and grabbing unsuspecting women’s butts while filming their reactions.

“I actually liked some of his previous videos. I thought they were funny, but his most recent video I think crossed the line. It was inappropriate and I cringed watching it,” said sophomore Terry Tan.

The video was immediately taken down by YouTube due to the unfavorable feedback and angry viewers.

“To turn sexually harassing women into a prank video really sends the wrong message to such a huge audience. I feel like he doesn’t understand that touching women without them being okay with it is sexual harassment. The women were clearly uncomfortable and he put them in a bad situation,” said sophomore Kiana Carroll.

Other famous YouTube celebrities like Tyler Oakley, Laci Green, and Meghan Camarena are taking a stand against his behavior. Many of them have tweeted out to Sam expressing their disapproval, and Laci Green has even written a letter imploring him to consider the implications of his actions. Sam Pepper was banned from VidCon and Playlist Live as well.

“It makes me really upset that Sam would think he could get away with something like that,” said Meghan Camarena during an interview with Fusion’s Alicia Menendez.

After the social media uproar, Sam Pepper posted another video explaining the reasoning behind his “butt-grabbing” prank video. He claims that the prank was not only staged, but also a “social experiment”.

Regardless of his efforts to justify what he did, this video also received negative feedback. As a result, he took it down from his YouTube channel. Furthermore, Sam Pepper is now being accused of rape as well as harassing adolescent girls. Nonetheless, there is a lot of dispute whether all these accusations are completely true.

“I have known Sam for a while, and I was subscribed to him for a while – but his content is not something I’m watching more of lately” said Zoe Sugg, YouTube celebrity, when asked by Now magazine.

 FSA Connection Questions

1. In the article what is the author’s main idea?
2. Select a sentence in the article that supports the main idea?
3. In the article the word “imploring” means what?
4. Use the word “imploring” in a sentence similar to the one in the article?
5. Summarize the article in one sentence?