The curious case of Gemma Sullivan has niggled at me for weeks now.
Have you heard of her? Gem Gem. Yeah, that one – the Gemma of ‘Don’t f*ck with Gem Gem’ fame.
Gemma is ‘Facebook famous’, which unsurprisingly is where I first found her. She dropped into my peripheral vision in a viral video that was doing the rounds among my friends.
“What the hell is wrong with her?” read one share.
“OMG,” said another, “SO FUNNY. Literally crying.”
Of course, I clicked. That’s the horror of the modern world of the internet – we click, and don’t know why. I’m sorry I did: the video of Gemma Sullivan and her boyfriend Justin Ryan (also ‘Facebook famous’) was awful. They seemed a little strange. They were responding to online bullies who were harassing them. It all felt really wrong.
And yet, here were people I knew and respected in my social media web sharing the video as entertainment. They were laughing. Laughing? I was lost.
And to be perfectly honest, I still am. The situation is exactly as it initially seemed: people are making fun of a young woman who could be struggling.
I cringe even to write this piece because I don't know what Gemma's situation is. I do know from her videos that something is up with this young girl, and yet she's still fair game to the internet's trolls.
In those videos, Gemma swears like a trooper, is aggressive, often has heavy makeup smudged on her face, smokes pot, and talks a lot about her sex life. She's the perfect target for bullies, and yet this is what it is to be an online celebrity in 2016: she loves it. Or appears to.
Welcome to the modern world of Facebook Famous youth, the young people we can't protect - and who cannot protect themselves.
I have trawled the internet for almost two days trying to find out everything I can about Gemma Sullivan and Justin Ryan, but the deeper down the wormhole I go, the less I seem to find out.
I spoke to several people on Facebook to try and get to the bottom of the story. Gemma and Justin both didn't reply, so I tried a few of their friends. The only people who responded had never actually met the couple, and had only interacted online. One guy was so keen to also be 'Facebook Famous' he asked if I could write an interview on him instead. He then tried calling me twice.
Another guy admitted to only following Gemma and Justin "...to take the piss with my friends." Did he feel guilty?
"Not really," he said, "as I never publicly shame them."
It's a weird, weird world where they have thousands of online 'friends' - yet no one seems to know anything about them.
Here's what social media tells us: Gemma lives in Brisbane. She's 18 years old. She has 26,200 followers on Instagram. She's dating Justin Ryan. She smokes weed, drinks a lot, and talks about sex a lot too. She has a YouTube channel, a Snapchat account, and several Facebook pages dedicated to her. She's abused constantly across all her social media platforms, and yet still posts almost daily.
Here's what we don't know: if she's OK. Why her strange videos are filmed with makeup everywhere. Why she continues to post despite the avalanche of vile comments thrown her direction. Where her family is. What she does for work. Whether her online persona is in fact real.
In 2016, this is a fairly standard place to find yourself in. We know so much about these viral 'celebrities', and yet we really know nothing at all.
Perhaps this is why people find themselves able to share a video of a young girl and laugh at her, call her ‘inbred’, call her ‘retarded’, and mimic her - because there is no human connection. Gemma Sullivan, to these people, is just another character in the hit parade of strange folk we are confronted with online everyday.
A short section of one of Gemma's YouTube rants. (Post continues after video)
It's appalling. An old friend of mine shared the video just this morning alongside a laughing face emoji. She's 45, with a child of her own and a good solid brain in her head. I used to really like her.
YouTube channel Mr Viral has 4.5 million viewers and uploaded Gemma's infamous 'Don't F*ck With Gem Gem' video in October of last year with the caption, "She is golden, and the makeup is on point!" It's had over 60,000 views, and has collected 350 comments, many from people abusing Gemma. Without any apparent moderation from Mr Viral management.
Even Kyle Sandiland's girlfriend Imogen Anthony joined the party, using her Snapchat account to mimic Gemma and encourage her followers to watch the video too.
I could write for days about how appalling I find online bullying, but I know we're all fatigued of that topic. Yes, online bullying happens. The average punter believes that it's deserved, in some way or another, for putting themselves online in the first place. But this conversation moves past all of that, and onto something far more serious – it seems that something isn't quite right with Gemma, and still, people are laughing at her.
If Gemma and Justin were not 'Facebook Famous' but a brother or a daughter or a friend, would people still be sharing these videos as they laugh? I doubt it. But for some reason, because Gemma puts out viral videos in which she swears and yells and raps and sings, she's fair game. She's funny. Except people are laughing at her, not with her.
And then there's Justin. Also really young, Justin uploads videos all the time to a sea of cackling followers. Like Gemma, he doesn't seem to understand or notice that people are laughing at him.
One video from May this year broke my heart - Justin outed himself as gay because he was sick of being hurt by girls.
"You need to learn how to speak correctly you dumb c*nt eat a dick faggot," was just one of responses that video received.
Oh, the horror if this is real: a poor young man opening his heart and being viciously ripped to shreds by the sneering hyenas of the internet.
Even after all my digging, I still can't find Gemma Sullivan or Justin Ryan 'funny'.
I don't know if I am being trolled by an elaborate online joke, or if Gemma and Justin are real. It's a weird world for teens these days - everyone has these elaborate online personas, intimate reflections of themselves. Who knows what's real or fake online anymore.
What I DO know is real, however, are the comments. It's violent, abhorrent language that shocks me to the core, particularly since Gemma doesn't seem to understand why people are laughing at her.
"Imagine the smell of her c*nt...would be like hot garbage i reckon," wrote one YouTube commenter.
"It seriously looks like someone did a burnout on your face. yiu [sic] shouldn't have been born." wrote another.
It's baffling, it's strange, it's awful - it's the brave new world of social media.
Nothing is sacred, and anyone - even those who we should protect - have the ability to throw themselves into a world without privacy and without safety. But this is how it works now, doesn't it?
The internet really is eradicating the human touch in more ways than one.
Top Comments
I have known Gemma for many years, she went to primary school with my daughter.
Gemma was raised by her grandparents whom did an AMAZING job but sadly the bullying drove Gemma into a horrible direction.
She hated being bullied and told she was ugly, poor girl was born with some sort of bone issue which distorted her little face, she had operations to correct this as much as possible.
Her year 6 formal was approaching so my girlfriend and I did her hair and makeup to make her feel pretty, I went with her so she would have a “mum” figure like the other kids.
My father and step mother used to take her to church and I spent many hours on the phone with Gemma and spent time defending her to the online bullies but it appears Gemma learnt to embrace the bullying.
She wanted what all girls want, a boyfriend to feel loved and this lust for love was her downfall.
Gemmas online fame even led to a horrible assault.
Gemma is a young lady with feelings and a sweet little heart, I really hope she has found a better direction these days.
I have known Gemma since she was 5/6 and myself and my family know that nothing she has done or says is an act. She does have something wrong, but that's who she is. People hav abused her for years and when a few of the first videos had risen onto the web, myself my mother and my sister, who was best friends with Gemma for years, jumped to her defence because not only does Gemma not deserve all the crap that gets said and thrown at her but no body deserves it. Online bullying and bullying in real life has become such a huge issue for the last few and current generations and it's such a shame that it will be future generations issues.
If someone like Gemma were your relation, any decent human being would defend her/him because you love them for who they are. People seem to think that because she isn't related to them that it's perfectly okay to follow the crowd to mock and laugh and put her down, but they need to ask themselves, "what if she were my daughter".
Countless attempts at suicide and such other things as smoking cigarettes and marijuana have been the outcome to this bullying. Not only is it stabbing at her self esteem but the negativity is a risk to her health and wellbeing.
My only question is, "how can people be so cruel? We are one species. We are one big family. We are all connected. Regardless of what videos or photos go on the net, and what memes or trolls get put out there, how can anyone be so nasty? Protect what is yours. The earth is ours and Gemma is apart of our world."
I was best friends with Gemma's sister, and am currently still a huge part of her life, and the results of Gemma's online, and real life abuse has made an impact on her family. You aren't putting down one human being, you're insulting a vast range of the people that love and care for her.
Imagine if one nasty comment was enough to push Gemma over the edge to end her life. Everyone who has ever made a snide, mean, rude comment should have just held the gun to her head and pulled the trigger. The blood gold Gemma and the sadness and loss of her family, would be in your hands.
Well, hopefully her friends and family are more important than people on the internet. Still funny as hell though.
Anybody who doesn't see her for what she is and feels the need to insult her are the sort of ppl who hate themselves. To me the sad part is finding out how many people need to even just like themselves more let alone love themselves and constantly put others down to make themselves feel better. They never feel better as really they are telling that person what they think of themselves. The laughers are apathetic