We Filipinos are suckers for a shout-out, and the Internet knows it. Slap “White Guy Tries Jollibee for the First Time” on a YouTube thumbnail (with prominent Jollibee branding), and we’ll click without hesitation. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve delighted in watching wide-eyed Americans gag on balut, or sunburnt Europeans rave about Boracay like they’ve never seen a beach before. Everyday, a new content creator — often foreign, often Caucasian, but hey, we won’t generalize — “discovers” Pinoy culture, and every day, we eat it up. Call it leftovers of our colonial era, but we love seeing foreigners fawn over us, even if they’re just using our culture for views.
The unfortunate reality is that not every Pinoy-focused content creator comes with the best intentions. Take, for instance, Russian YouTuber Vitaly Zdorovetskiy and his March 30 livestream titled, “DISTURBING THE PEACE in Philippines 😈.” On the stream, Zdorovetskiy, who has over 10 million subscribers on his channel, can be seen being a public menace on the streets of Bonifacio Global City, screaming the lyrics of Lady Gaga’s “Paparazzi” at a confused security guard, stealing a traffic officer’s patrol motorcycle, and verbally harassing an older woman who refused to speak to him.
Clips from the livestream immediately went viral. Zdorovetskiy was arrested a few days later, and at the time of writing, is preparing to face trial this June for three counts of unjust vexation with the possibility of three months to one year of jail time in the Philippines.
Another case of a Pinoy baiting influencer gone wrong is Israeli-Palestinian vlogger Nuseir Yassin (a.k.a. Nas Daily). With nearly 14 million YouTube subscribers, Yassin has built a career on creating clickbait videos (think titles like “How To Live Life Without Getting Lucky” or “This Man Ages Backwards?”). But Yassin gained popularity among Filipino audiences a few years ago due to his more Pinoy-centric videos, like “How American Is The Philippines?!”
In 2021, Yassin featured Kalinga tattoo artist Whang-Od in a video titled “World’s Oldest Tattoo Artist.” He even set up an online course in her name, promising to teach viewers the 108-year-old artist’s traditional techniques. However, Whang-Od’s grandniece Gracia Palicas quickly took to Facebook to expose Yassin as a fraud. “Whang Od Academy is a scam,” wrote Palicas. “My grandmother did not sign any contract with [Yassin] to do any academy. Some people are taking advantage of our culture.”
Adding even more fuel to the fire, Filipina environmentalist-influencer Louise Mabulo also took to social media to accuse Yassin’s racist behavior when the two collaborated on a video together. “I watched him imitate and mock the local accent and language, vocalizing Tagalog-sounding syllabic phrases [and] saying it sounded stupid,” wrote Mabulo in a Facebook post. “He repeatedly said that the people of my hometown [are] ‘poor’ [and] ‘farmers are so poor!’ ‘Why are Filipinos so poor?’”
Yassin has denied the allegations from both Palicas and Mabulo. In response to the environmentalist, he claimed in a Facebook post that Mabulo’s non-profit Cacao Project is in reality a “for-profit that exploits farmers” and that he had never mocked the Filipino accent. To Palicas’ claim, Yassin asserted that he had received consent from Whang-Od and her family to create an online course. In a video titled “Be Careful of Fake Posts” which responds to the controversy, Yassin said, “We’re not perfect, we make mistakes. But our intentions are pure!” The video has 2.8 million views to date.
Pinoy Bait or Pinoy Appreciation?
Whether intentional or not, foreign creators often walk a fine line between showcasing and sensationalizing the Philippines.
“As a creator, I do want to be respectful of a culture that I didn’t grow up in and don’t know a lot about,” Tom Keugler (a.k.a. Finding Tom) told Rolling Stone Philippines. “But at the same time, do I not have the right to say something either?”
At the height of his career as an influencer, Keugler was living in the Philippines and posting videos with titles such as “I Love How Respectful Filipino Culture Is,” “The Difference Between Filipinos and Americans,” and “10 Amazing Filipino Life Hacks.” His videos garnered a range of a hundred thousand to over two million views, with Filipino fans in particular flooding their comment sections. “As a natural-born Filipino, I can guarantee that this is 100% accurate,” wrote one YouTube user. “Yes, these are all correct Filipino ways,” wrote another.
Although Keugler has stepped away from the online spotlight in recent years, he does reflect on the videos that he wishes were less critical of Pinoy culture. “I started talking about some of the more controversial stuff [in the Philippines], like the skin whitening issue so that people could look more like Westerners,” recalled Keugler. While most of his videos’ comments were full of “praise and adoration,” Keugler noted how he’d also receive “super intense, borderline hatred” comments.
However, looking back on his career, Keugler acknowledged that he could have been more sensitive about the cultural nuances he was commenting on. “My friend Jared [a foreign content creator who posts under the handle Puting Pinoy], talked to me about this privately,” said Keugler. “He sat me down and said, ‘Tom, some of what you’re doing is really problematic. At first I was kind of defensive, but eventually said, ‘You’re right about this.’”
Other content creators reject the concept of Pinoy baiting completely, arguing that it is never their intention to exploit Filipino culture. “[If] someone is making a video about being in the Philippines and their experience [there], what else are they supposed to title it?” George and Lucy, the UK-based couple behind YouTube channel The Juicy Vlog, told Rolling Stone Philippines.
After visiting the Philippines for a brief vacation, the couple decided to relocate there and create content documenting their time in the country. Some of their more viral videos include “British Couple Try Filipino Mang Inasal for the First Time” and “Filipino Shopping Malls Are Insane! Cebu, Philippines.” Although they have expanded their content scope to cover other countries, they continue to regularly return to the subject of the Philippines.
“I don’t feel like anyone’s ever been tricked into watching our videos,” the couple said. “If I title my video ‘crazy motorbike does insane backflip over fireball’ and then you click on the video and it’s just me taking a walk talking about my new walking boots, then that’s the definition of clickbait. If I make videos about video games and title them about video games, am I gamer baiting? If I review running shoes on my channel, am I runner baiting because I want runners to watch my videos?”
Although George and Lucy’s response may seem reductive, especially when considering how sensitive a topic like cultural appropriation can be, there is some truth to it: Content creators aren’t necessarily tricking us into watching their videos. The numbers speak for themselves, so aren’t we part of the problem, too? As viewers, we can’t help always wanting to see ourselves reflected in the content we consume, no matter how shallow the mirror.
This doesn’t absolve creators of responsibility, but it does force us to reckon with our own role in the cycle. Pinoy baiting persists not just because it works, but because we keep proving time and time again that we’ll fall for it. The harder question to ask is not why influencers continue to create this type of content, but why we continue to need it.
