 I think that we can all agree that child predators are monsters. If anything, laws against child predators should be more strict and not loosened. As a father, I do just about anything to keep my son safe from predators. But one of the issues that we face is the spread of misinformation. When misinformation is spread, we hurt our ability to protect children rather than help them. One of the most recent pieces of misinformation that's been spread is about a bill in California. The narrative is that this bill makes laws more lenient for child predators, but that's not actually the case. Those of us who are critical thinkers know that we can't be headline readers and we need to investigate before following narratives. The problem is that large creators are helping to spread this false narrative, which damages what we're trying to accomplish. One of the creators who has spread this misinformation is Blair White, a trans YouTuber with almost one million subscribers. In a recent video, here's what she had to say about the bill in California. And here's the part where I just really ran because I'm getting really fed up with anytime, you know, I've been chronicling the rise and the normalization and the push really for the acceptance of pet in mainstream culture. I've watched it start happening four years ago when I started this channel and I really started documenting it. It's only grown and expanded and the push is much more overt. And I'm getting really sick of people anytime you say that there is a push to normalize pet. We have the fact that people will scoff at you like, are you joking? Like, oh my God, this is a conspiracy theory. This is whatever. Think of people who, you know, crap on the state of our children, hashtag, etc., etc. I'm sorry, you have to either be a predator yourself or you have to be in complete denial or not paying attention to not see that there is a push to make this happen. Just this week in California, bill SB 145 passed, which makes it so that in California, if you have consensual relations with children, we know it's never consensual, but that is literally the wording of it. If that happens and the minor is within 10 years of your own age, you don't have to put on the registry. Now, if you were to take what Blair said at face value without looking into it for yourself, you'd think that a bill was presented that allowed sexual misconduct with children and that it was passed. But as you'll see, that's a gross misrepresentation of what the bill actually says and does. This is a narrative that's been going on for a few weeks now on TikTok. And while many people are spreading this misinformation on TikTok, it's even worse that a large creator like Blair White is spreading it as well. Currently, her video has over 600,000 views. Not only that, but she's a trans YouTuber. And when you look at the bill, it was actually an adjustment to an existing bill that was discriminating towards the LGBTQ community. So what does the bill actually say? In this fact check from the Sacramento Bee, it says, Under existing law since 1944, when a person is found by a court to have had intercourse with a minor 14 years of age or older, the age difference is not more than 10 years. Judges are given discretion as to whether to require that person to register as a sex offender. I'm going to ad-lib this a little bit. However, that discretion only pertains to male and female sex offenders who are heterosexual. But Wiener's bill would give judges discretion in those cases. He said it's about treating LGBTQ young people the same as straight young people. So this law that's nearly 100 years old and all it did was make this law to protect young children who were violated by homosexual behavior as well as heterosexual behavior. Like I said, if anything, these laws should be more strict, but creators like Blair White are spreading misinformation. When misinformation is spread, it hurts what we're all trying to do. Just a quick note that I thought of while I was editing this and I forgot to put in the actual video. So two things, one could argue that this bill actually does make the law more strict because now you can be punished for homosexual child abuse. And the second thing is that as you saw from the fact check that this doesn't mean that a person does not have to register. This is at the judge's discretion. So one could argue that it should be mandatory and it should not be at the judge's discretion. But nowhere does it say that this is just not implemented at all. We need to share the right information. As a creator with almost 1 million subscribers who discusses current events, Blair White has an ethical responsibility to the community to do her research before spreading information like this. Child predators are a real issue. And the sex trafficking of children is also a very real issue. In recent years, a good friend of mine had her teenage daughter abducted with the intent to sex traffic and fortunately my friend was able to rescue her daughter. We're dealing with very real issues but when creators like Blair White spread misinformation it distracts from what's actually going on. If you remember a few months ago, a Wayfair conspiracy was spreading and it's been thoroughly debunked. Here's a tick tock I found discussing how ridiculous it was. So you guys remember the Wayfair conspiracy from like a month ago? Yeah, how dumb are people? Well, like at first I understood the whole like initial shock of it because Wayfair is kind of a sketchy app and they had those ridiculous prices and the whole name thing. But that was like so easily disproven by all the companies and anyone who tried to actually buy any of the products. So if you didn't know the companies that were listing the products when they would go out of stock they would just jack the price up so they didn't have to do list the product. And then when it restocked they would lower the price back down. Pretty much all the names of the missing kids were disproven by the people themselves. One of the girls that was missing came out and said like she hasn't been missing for like six years. In my opinion, we're facing a major problem with what's known as slactivism. It's become such a widespread phenomenon that the dictionary even has a definition for it now. The dictionary definition is the practice of supporting a political or social cause by means such as social media or online petitions characterized as involving very little effort or commitment. Recently I made a video discussing the very real issues around the movie cuties. I personally refuse to watch the movie because I find it pretty gross. But I've seen plenty of videos like Blair's that blur out the troubling scenes. Meanwhile, I think videos from Blair White and others are a prime example of slactivism. People are expressing their outrage over this movie while putting minimal effort into actually trying to solve the problems in our world. It's easy to make YouTube videos and TikToks or tweet and leave comments saying to cancel Netflix but it takes real effort to help organizations that are actually fighting against child abuse. It's easy to spread misinformation about California bills regarding child predator laws but it takes effort to do research and actually try to fight for solutions. As I see it, the problem is that most people would rather signal to the tribe what side they're on instead of putting in the actual work. When this results in the spreading of misinformation, not doing research and refusing to have nuanced conversations, it hurts everything that we're trying to accomplish. Alright everybody, thanks for checking out this quick video. I think it's extremely important that we hold larger creators accountable who are sharing information. It has to be correct. Like I know the majority of people are just headline readers and they spread what plays into their confirmation bias. And like I said in my video yesterday, these things play into our intuitions. We're like, hmm, that sounds like it could be real, I'll just share this. But when a creator like Blair White has almost one million subscribers, she has an ethical responsibility to share the correct information. And like I said at the end of this video, I believe that slactivism is a huge, huge problem. We are very tribal beings and we're always trying to signal to our tribe, here's what side I'm on, here's what I'm against, here's what I'm for and all these things. But people aren't putting in the actual work. There are so, so, so many organizations out there to help. Like I know we're in the middle of a pandemic so you can't necessarily get together and you know do all these like protests and marches and gatherings and everything like that. But there are so many online organizations, alright? If you would like to contribute to some, I've linked a few down in the description below. But if you would like to learn more about what I'm talking about with slactivism, I just finished an amazing book, an absolutely amazing book that discusses all the issues going on right now and it's called Gray Unstanding. I've talked to the authors, they're awesome guys and like I've linked it down below. Check it out and realize that most of us are just trying to signal and say what side we're on rather than actually putting in the work and we need to change that, alright? It's easy to just leave comments and make videos and stuff like that but we need to actually put in the work if we want to make this world a better place and actually insight change, alright? But anyways, that's all I got for this video. If you liked this video, please give it a thumbs up. If you're new, make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell. And a huge, huge thank you to everybody who supports the channel on Patreon or getting my books from the Rewire of Soul.com or getting merch from the merch store. You're all awesome. Alright? Thanks again for watching. I'll see you next time.