Kids Want to be Youtube Stars

I was recently returning from Detroit on a Southwest Airlines flight when I came across an interesting article in the in-flight magazine.  I normally don’t spend a lot of time reading the magazines found in the seat pocket.  It is usually limited to those periods during takeoff and landing when I am asked to “store my large electronic device.”  In this brief, one page, piece focused on kids and Youtube.  It offered the shocking stat that 29% of kids want to be Youtubers when they grow up. 

For those who are uninformed; a Youtuber is an individual who makes a living producing videos and posting them on the social media website.  Just how you make money producing videos that people can watch for free I quite frankly don’t know, but when it comes to computers and social media I am oblivious on a lot of things.  The truth is more kids want to be internet stars than astronauts.  I have to wonder what happened to the days when kids dreamed of being a fireman, professional athlete or even a doctor.

Then I got to thinking.  During my middle school years I dreamed of being a disc jockey.  We had a family friend who was the nighttime DJ on the most popular top 40 station in Detroit, WXYZ.  His on the air persona was Wacky Weiss but in actuality he was Fred Weiss who sang in the bass section in the church choir.  On evenings when he was doing a remote broadcast, which in those days was quite common, we would stop by and watch him at work.  I was hooked.  I thought that was coolest job in the world and I would spend hours in my room programing my own 45 rpm records and practicing my on-the-air voice.  One evening in college we got to talking and it was surprising how many of my dorm-mates did a similar thing. 

Perhaps being a Youtuber is not that ridiculous.  The important thing is make sure our kids are surrounded by adults who keep them grounded in terms of faith and values.  In the end we are to do all things to God’s glory.  The requires that all of us filter how we use social media through the lens of humility and servanthood.