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Culture > Entertainment

Trisha Paytas: When does trolling go too far?

Olga Golberg
Monica Sager
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Clark chapter.

Trisha Paytas is a famous YouTuber known for her trolling antics, wild ranting videos, and mukbangs. With 5.8 million subscribers amassed across two main channels, Trisha uploads shocking and sometimes controversial content.

She crosses many boundaries and often makes people question which parts of her content are comedy or satire, and which parts are reality? The lines blur as her content changes everyday.

Some days, she vlogs her life, branding herself on honesty. Other days, she posts click-bait videos titled “My Ethnicity Has Changed,” “Why Can’t I Identify as Gay?,” and “Why I Retired From Being Gay.” Trisha exploits touchy subjects for views, despite the controversy it brings. 

Most recently, she uploaded a video titled, “I am transgender: female to male.” In the video Paytas identifies herself as a transgender man. She says that she will continue to use female pronouns, and isn’t a fan of “they” and “them” pronouns. She explains to her subscribers, “So, do I think I’m transgender? Yes, a thousand percent. Do I identify with my natural born gender? A thousand percent.” 

People have also taken to issue several other statements she made in the video. Her explanation for why she identifies as a male is harmful for the transgender community. She explained her decision to identify as male in statements such as, “I don’t like to be the center of attention” and “I don’t wear makeup or do my hair in my day to day life”. These are harmful ideas to spread to a large audience, as they invalidate the transgender community’s struggle. 

Subsequently, Paytas posted an apology video and another video titled “I am questioning”. Fans are skeptical whether Trisha is truly opening up and coming out to the internet about her identity struggle, or stirring up controversy at the expense of the LGBTQ community. This makes it a hard line to walk for her viewers. Do they accept her words at face value, or do they look at her long history of offensive trolling?

Here are a few tweets to sum up the reactions of the internet to Trisha Paytas’s latest controversy.

Olga is a senior at Clark University studying psychology and marketing. She's got a serious coffee addiction and a passion for writing.
Monica Sager is a freelance writer from Clark University, where she is pursuing a double major in psychology and self-designed journalism with a minor in English. She wants to become an investigative journalist to combat and highlight humanitarian issues. Monica has previously been published in The Pottstown Mercury, The Week UK, Worcester Telegram and Gazette and even The Boston Globe. Read more of Monica’s previous work on her Twitter @MonicaSager3.