- Joined
- Dec 17, 2022
Possible, but one would think Sean was at least paying attention to the person he was associating with for professional reasons. My initial point was more about observational skills.
Essentially, I don't know what Sean knew, but I know what he was present for. Sean could have been distracted by his own chat or the like, has a poor memory, or just plain wasn't invested in the streams he was on with Nick. In any case, he doesn't seem very reliable not in that he is lying about anything, but he seems to either not be that observant or playing some kind of politics. Sean's legal insight does seem to be good though, and he also seems to be more impartial in what he covers.
As for Nick being very good at obfuscating things, it seems like he was a popular rallying point against certain people like Maddox, Binger, Ron Soye, and Montagraph. This would create a halo effect in which Nick looks better then he really is due to a bias against his targets, and even among his peers the bar is pretty low when it comes to looking wholesome.
That said, I can't say I know of any Christian trad-dads who are as publicly inebriated, belligerent, conceited, hateful, and heretical while being close friends with the likes of Drexel or Juju the Cow. A lot of this was on display before the summer of 2022. It seems to me that somewhere between not wanting to judge someone for their actions or the company they keep they lost the ability to recognize these warning signs.
Agreed, Sean was engaging with Nick on a professional basis for professional gain. Also, I don't mean to single Sean out here. Sean wasn't the only one doing it and Nick likely ended up with more goodwill from some of Sean's fanbase due to his optimism, rightly or wrongly so. Such is the way of social currency. I also agree that Sean's channel should see more growth given his knowledge and general good humor.
As for Sean's standards for people considering his line of work, this again puts him at a disadvantage (especially if Nick would have to shoot someone before being considered a bad person). One likes to think that Sean has more sense than that, but there really is no accounting for what passes for good/decent in LawTube or IRL.
I do find Sean likable though, even if I am cautious of him. From what I've seen, Sean is trying to maintain some integrity despite whatever disadvantages he may have and seems to be doing quite well at the moment. While final judgement belongs to the Lord, I am still compelled to use discernment in my understanding of others to avoid being led astray.
I'm not asking Sean to prove himself to me. I'm just voicing my own assessment.
Indeed. Nick would claim to pay people in exposure as part of the incentive to join his show which is somewhat reasonable on a professional level. Networking and trading in social currency happens in a lot of professions.
Nick was also likely incentivizing a transactional relationship likely because those are the only relationships he seems to understand (even with he parasocial lewding LOCALS). Nick has no real friends and likely doesn't even really know what those are. Sean, on the other hand, does strike me as someone who actually has friends outside of YouTube.
Nick used to stream a lot, making it easy to bury certain streams. One could argue that even the farms didn't have the time to go through all of it. Some farmers appear to have just gotten highlights from clip channels or whatever was already posted here (a lot still do).
In Sean's case I just kept coming across him in relevant clips concerning Nick's real character coming through or other warning signs. Sean would usually use humor to (successfully) break the tension because he does seem like a good guest. Given what Sean was exposed to I mostly wonder how much of the experience he actually retained.
In a way, one can't really blame Sean too much for mentally repressing Nick's more embarrassing streams during his decline.
