July 27, 2010

YouTube’s Big Gay Fail [VIDEO]

Ryan James Yezak/YouTube video still.

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While the Lutheran church has finally reconciled its faith with the shocking reality that members of its congregation and clergy might be gay, it seems YouTube might still need some help from users.

Ryan James Yezak has a prolific YouTube channel, including an online gay reality show, “In the Loop.” But, it’s his parody of Katy Perry’s summer jam “California Gays” (see below for both videos) that struck internet gold—until YouTube slapped it with an adult content warning. Is a video of boys in short shorts dancing with beach balls really worse than one of Katy Perry in an ejaculating bikini? Let’s compare the two:

It gets pretty epic in the second half—camp and choreography and short shorts, oh my! But other than a very, very veiled reference to gay sex there isn’t an obvious reason why the video would be deemed “adult” content. Particularly when compared to this Katy Perry original:

As Yezak learned, it is notoriously hard to find out why a video has been flagged or taken down. Fortunately, other social media sites are helpful in finding ways around YouTube’s apparent customer service blockade. Yezak enlisted his Twitter followers and Facebook friends to contact YouTube’s general press email address. Within a day and a half the flagging was removed, with no explanation given.

In the end, it seems the California gays won. As of Monday, the video had over 1.5 million views and even Katy Perry loves it.

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It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

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