Fall 2022 ︎︎︎ SUNY Purchase College ︎︎︎ (DES4100) Community Design
What is Community? Video Series: The Cult of David Dobrik
Introduction
This is a video by Donna. Her channel was formerly called PsychIRL and is now called Internet Impact. I stopped getting her videos in my feed whenever this name change happened but can vouch her videos are good if you enjoy pretty thoughtful commentary on current “internet events.” This video covers a lot of territory and does a good job (in my opinion) of balancing the discussion of cults
The Required Viewing
This video is ~1 hour long. And content warning if you can’t deal with the following: Trisha Paytas or Scientology being mentioned interchangably with the term cult.
Questions and Concepts to Consider
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What other internet communities do you observe (even macabrely) that might be considered “cult-like” by the standards set out in the video: family channels? shock jocks? Qanon supporters?
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Is or was David Dobrik someone that was or is charismatic or appealing to you?
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Have you had a parasocial relationship with a creator like David Dobrik?
- How might content like this shape the future of interpersonal relationships? Jobs? Life?