George Carlin had that list of dirty words you couldn’t say on TV back in the 70’s. Record labels release edited versions of hit songs to clean them up for radio. Movies are always censored to remove nudity and profanity for TV.

Over the years, laws and regulations have relaxed a lot on what they allow to get through to our living rooms. Ironically, the original wild west of free data sharing, the internet, feels like it’s going backwards. At least YouTube does, anyway.

I watch more YouTube than any other streaming service because I prefer regular people and DIY creators over big Hollywood productions. I even started paying for Premium when Google waged all out war on ad blockers. It’s worth the money to me.​

But it’s almost comical the lengths they go to demonetize a video. You have to censor literally every curse word or you’ll be demonetized. You can’t mention death or injury, even in a clearly educational way, or you’re demonetized.

If you set up a camera facing you and your friends and another facing the television, you can literally upload an entire feature length film because it’s technically a reaction video. But if you’re shooting a vlog outside and accidentally catch a few seconds of a Taylor Swift song playing from the stereo of a car passing by in the background, you’re guilty of copyright infringement.

Sometimes I feel like I must be out of the loop and all the self-censoring is just a big inside joke, but I really don’t think it is. It just feels so strange to watch. You can have a true crime channel talking about the most gruesome murders imaginable but you can’t even say “murder,” you have to say unalive​. Wild. I think Google is just fucking with everyone at this point.