The Fall of ProJared
ScrewAttack To Normal Boots
Okay, Well lets get some context as to where we where just before the events that I'm sure placed the name ProJared in to many of your minds if you weren't already interested in that side of YouTube.
Jared's first online job was working for ScrewAttack in 2009 writing reviews and doing general editing work, however only a year later Jared would upload a review of “Two Worlds” to his own channel that would later be renamed to ProJared. With this upload he gained almost immediate success with his quiet nerdy charm bringing viewers in and them staying for his dry whit and unique review style.
In 2014 his success would gain him an exclusive spot with Normal Boots, an organisation of several YouTubers who similarly would review games and nerd culture. This put him alongside more popular heavy hitters on the platform like Jontron, PeanutButterGamer and Continue?, and other than Satchel Drakes, Jared would be the only creator added outside the original line-up.
By 2016 he was even a regular on the official Dungeons and Dragons YouTube channel, cementing him as a large nerd culture personality online.
2018 However is where things get a little bit... Off.
After releasing his E3 reactions (An annual tradition on his channel) and Two sponsored reviews he goes silent.
December arrives, as does another annual tradition for Jared, his D&December, a dungeons and dragons themed month where he would usually post about 4+ videos on or surrounding the subject. December 2018 ends and there is only one video up this month.
But then silence throughout the whole year of 2019, silence until that is the 9th of May...
A Statement
On May the 9th Jared took to his twitter where he tweeted “A statement” with an attacked text image that you can see below.
So he's getting a divorced, nothing too new here but then he gets a tweet back from a concerned friend Holly Conrad who tweeted at him her concern and that he could come to her for any needed shoulders to cry on.
There was a lot of support for Jared during the first few hours of this statement being made public, a divorce is hard for anyone and it's reasonable that they both just wasn't privacy and for anyone to avoid spreading rumours as they tend to do, and this seems like a pretty normal breakup all in all.
Then Heidi O'Ferrall (Jared's then Wife and ever more popular cosplay YouTuber) spoke up on twitter and that was where the storm started and the truth about this supposedly loved YouTube star and what he is really like behind the scenes.
Yep, What you are reading there is true. ProJared had been sleeping with Holly Conrad for month behind her back and not only that but in order to control the narrative and keep her in the dark Jared blocked her just before his “Statement”.
This was probably the smartest and Dumbest things he did. It's unavoidable that many of her subscribers where transfers from his channel and honestly as you can see in Heidi's own words most of the bigger content makers and biggest voices on the platform where exclusivity his friends so if everything is just a case of he said, she said who would everyone believe?
Jared right?
Well, yes if it wasn't for one final big twists in this tale.
Crime and Tumblr
On that same day serious allegations came out about Jared and his interactions with young fans through both his Tumblr and Snapchat accounts, claiming that he had allegedly sent and received nude and explicit images from minors, using is influence as a YouTuber to get them in to send them.
In a series of tweets Heidi explains “In the beginning, it was a joke on Tumblr. Then it was its own Tumblr account just for nudes. It was ostensibly a body-positive space for consenting adults” and that “It kept escalating secretly. He started a Snapchat, for getting nudes from fans, without telling me. I found out via a fan comment. I felt pressured to allow it even though I was uncomfortable.”
However it wasn't until the allegations from the victims started to flood in did anyone take too much note of this, and by the time Kotaku managed a full interview with one of the alleged victims did it become all to real for everyone.
The Aftermath
Well first of all and possibly most entertaining is the r/ProJared subreddit that is now essentially a graveyard of ProJared memes, with the top administrator even banning Jared himself from making any moderations to the page as his image is mocked hundred of times. Honestly If you have five seconds and a dark sense of humour I would go and give it a look, pretty funny if you ask me.
But what else happened to him? He lost over 100,000 subscribers in a day, only a short time after he had finally reached the 1 million subscriber goal. Over all he lost over 200,000 subs by the end of five days and the numbers just keep going down.
Unfortunately none of these accusation have been taken to authorities so far so it seems like we will just have to deal with the destruction of his life as he knows it rather than a potentially deserved prison sentence.
