Netflix’s latest original series, “Bad Influence: The Dark Side of Kidfluencing,” showcases how dangerous it is for young children to grow up having careers on YouTube.
The three-episode series focuses around a group of “kidfluencers” called “The Squad” who completed different internet challenges and featured in silly videos on platforms such as YouTube and TikTok. These videos were posted from the years of 2018-2021.
Tiffany Smith, mother of main member Piper Rockelle, became the manager of Rockelle and the rest of her “squad” while they were all just preteens. Their parents had no idea they could even make money from YouTube.
I personally had never heard of Rockelle until my 11-year-old cousin brought her up to me a long time ago. She described how the 17-year-old influencer was always posting videos in bikinis and “inappropriate” clothing at such a young age — at least it seems that kids are becoming more aware of how exploitative the internet is today.
I watched the trailer for the short docuseries last month and when I recognized the names brought up, I immediately became intrigued.
Rockelle started off competing in beauty pageants at a young age with her mother by her side. Once the two discovered the short-form video app Musical.ly — now TikTok — they found a whole new world of possibilities.
Rockelle had a brother on camera named Hunter Hill, but he was really their editor and had no familial relation to her. Still, he lived with her and Smith. In the beginning of the first episode it was revealed that Hill was — and still is — in a relationship with Smith, meaning they started dating when Hill was 19 and Smith was 37 in 2018.
Former member and best friend of Rockelle, Sophie Fergi and her mother moved into the Rockelle household after joining “The Squad” in 2019.
“She didn’t really have a mother,” Fergi said in the series, referring to Rockelle. “She just had this person in her life who made her do content and wasn’t really there in her best interest.”
The Rockelle household also had around 30 cats that they kept rescuing from abandoned buildings, so the kids would get done filming around 1 a.m. and then had to clean the house from the cats and themselves until 3 a.m. everyday. The two young girls would fall asleep on the stairs while cleaning the walls, as detailed by the moms in the docuseries.
Other squad members included the daughters of Patience Rock Smith, who is Smith’s sister. Squad members Claire and Reese also discussed their experience in the documentary along with their mothers, ex-member Corinne Joy Areeco and mother Steevy Areeco.
An old recurring bit was mentioned where the “momager” — a mom manager — would voice a pet pug named Frank when talking to the members. It was Smith’s way of being mean to the kids without doing it directly. Smith also used “Frank” to flirt with one of the members, Gavin, a 13-year old boy.
“You’ve got to remember, a lot of these kids joined The Squad during COVID,” said Fergi’s mother. “And a lot of these kids were actors. They weren’t in a regular school situation, they were mostly homeschooled. The Squad provided this amazing community and an opportunity to meet friends and make videos together.”
Episode two dives deeper into the weird sexual innuendos that Smith would implement within the group. A former member reflected on the time when Smith made a move on him on camera while he was 17, but the next day, the clip had been wiped from the internet.
The young members experienced Rockelle’s mother doing other inappropriate things in her house that a parent should never do, such as shipping Rockelle’s used undergarments to random predators online for money.
The docuseries was also very informative on the process of buying robot followers. These fake followers are cheap to buy from other countries. However, the issue is that influencers do not get paid from bots, only real users.
Now that most of the members are over 18 years old, 11 of them sued Smith over “emotional, verbal, physical, and at times, sexual abuse” along with the momager purposely interfering with and sabotaging their channels with the bot followers to “drive down their views ‘thereby significantly diminishing’ their own revenue.”
Unfortunately, both parties have since reached a $1.85 million settlement.
“[Smith is] a very smart businesswoman in a lot of ways and knows how to work the system,” director Kief Davidson said. “I just hope at the end of the day that this documentary becomes a real conversation piece for families and their kids to at least know what to look out for.”
Personally, I hope that when Rockelle turns 18 in a few months, she will find the strength to come forward. In the meantime, this docuseries serves as a vital piece of media shedding light on the atrocities of “kidfluencing.” I highly recommend watching.
5/5 stars
jcaramag@ramapo.edu
Featured photo courtesy of nflximg.net
