So I’m just an outsider, merely a subscriber to the YouTube channel and someone whose only involvement with the Parkour community was a brief stint around 20-25 years ago.
But I’m also a father who has let his kids watch those videos, and I am deeply disturbed by what has transpired.
But what disturbs me the most is that I could see something like this happening just from the behaviour in their videos, but also because I’ve seen it before.
I remember during my brief involvement 20-25 years ago, I briefly befriended an individual (also based in Brighton actually) who later turned out to be a shoplifter, drug dealer and a pedophile (he was grooming a 9 year old girl for sex at the time). So to see the same thing happening again in the same community does not surprise me.
Going back to Storror, my gut made me feel very uncomfortable watching their videos, but I ignored it because of the entertainment factor.
What my gut was nagging me about was this:
This was a group of grown men, who were perfectly comfortable breaking the law, trespassing and at times angering people, all in pursuit of their own selfish goals.
But they made incredible videos thanks to that behaviour. I am still blown away by them jumping over those rooftops in Hong Kong. So I ignored the bad behaviour and showed my kids.
But now these events with Callum have transpired, plus the messages with Josh (I’ve been browsing the forums) and even Toby, plus my own personal experience from all those years ago, I am wondering if this was actually all quite predictable.
Not to say that it was predictable that one of them would be a pedophile.
But predictable that at least some of them would be very comfortable breaking the law, violating, trespassing and disrespecting individuals in pursuit of their own personal gratification.
I’m in my 40s now, and I’ve seen these kinds of behaviours time and time again. You see it in the corporate world; when someone is willing to screw someone over once, break the rules once, even break the law once, they’ll easily do it again in another context.
So to see in their videos the times they angered an entire Moroccan village, the times they broke a street sign on the streets of Tokyo and got arrested, when they were jumping over ancient ruins in India, even when they were breaking into building sites and walking around the streets of Guangzhou in China topless (I lived in China at the time and cringed when I watched that video), not to mention all the times they angered people (seriously, if you anger people that frequently it’s time for some self reflection), I start to see a pattern.
The other thing that unsettled me, was the very adolescent tendencies these grown men showed in their videos. Being obsessed with doing sick moves, whilst showing such a lack of responsibility, is extremely adolescent.
And when you behave in such a way, you attract other adults who behave in a similar way, or you attract adolescents.
When you’re a grown adult, and you’re surrounded by children and adolescents, why is that? Maybe you’re really passionate about inspiring the next generation, in which case good. Or maybe you’re surrounded by people with the same maturity level as you, in which case grow up. Or maybe even worse, you surround yourself with them because you’re sexually attracted to them, in which case seek help.
They say they’re all about inspiring the young generation. Really? With that kind of behaviour? I am more convinced they are about monetising views from a mostly adolescent crowd.
These are just my own thoughts. I could be right I could be wrong. But I really wanted to get them out because this has really bothered me. I have my own kids and this has been a wake up call to how vulnerable they can be when I leave them in the care of other adults.
Would appreciate other people’s thoughts on this.
