PG 329: A Great Value Man

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1. 

   SuavyP

   05/20/2022 at 2:20 AM

   “My Name is Suavy… and I am a closeted Kevin Samuels content watcher.”

   In all seriousness, hello Rod, Karen and Justin! I wanted to chime in to provide some context on Kevin Samuels massive popularity from the perspective of a single guy who watched his content. Unlike most guys online, I was not surprised at the Ether that KS received when he passed. He was a controversial persona so to me it was expected. Since his death, a lot more info about Kevin’s early days on YouTube has come out, but I first learned of Kevin Samuels years ago from watching his cologne reviews. As my name implies, I’d like to say that I’m a “Suavy” guy and I enjoy menswear and learning about mens fragrances. Most don’t know but there is a vibrant menswear and mens’ fragrance community on YouTube. Kevin was one of maybe 2 black YouTube content creators at the time that I would watch fragrance reviews from a black male perspective. As I got busier with work, I wasn’t watching that much YouTube content and didn’t watch anything from Kevin for a while. Fast forward to the “Panasonic” and one day, as I was scrolling through facebook, a video on my feed began to play. There was a guy in a dimly lit room having a conversation with a caller and the voice I noticed sounded very familiar. This video was the infamous Kevin Samuels “Average at Best” clip that went viral. I said, “wait a minute.. This the cologne nigga from YouTube! When the hell did he start a Youtube dating advice show?!” Lol.. I couldn’t believe it. I then started googling and I realized that he had been making videos geared toward “life coaching” for men for the past couple years and less of the cologne review videos. Soon after, all i saw online were the viral clips of Kevin talking to black women. I had a lot of free time on my hands so i went waay back into Kevins YouTube catalog and began to watch his videos. I wanted to see why so many people were so outraged at him and i didn’t want to just see clips; I wanted full context. As I watched, all of his earlier videos and “tough love” rhetoric were aimed at men, specifically black men. But all the viral clips I would see on social media were clips when he talked to black women… Kevin has a background in sales, so once he saw the level of traction he was gaining whenever he would talk about women, his newer content increasingly became more skewed towards women. The earlier content on men was very brash and hilarious but they wouldn’t go viral; only the women videos. As an actual watcher, from a pure entertainment and business perspective, it made sense for KS to transition to talking with women. They were just more entertaining and salacious shows. Content creators/entertainers re-invent themselves all the time. People forget but the Jerry Springer Show was not always the Jerry Springer Show that we all know now. The first season had a much more serious tone and dealt with more serious topics. But the show pivoted after he was pressured by the network to have more salacious topics and to be more like Ricky Lake to generate better ratings. Springer made the switch and the show took off, making Springer a household name as the show people would watch for fights . Same thing happened with Maury. His show gained more ratings when he transitioned to “you are not the father”. I say this to say that I would not know KS was making this kind of content, until the backlash he received from the “average at best” video went viral. The backlash is what gained him a wider audience. Kevin knew this and capitalized on it. I do think there is something to say about being so outraged about a person, that you contribute to their success (i.e Joe Rogan’s recent success on Spotify). A lot of people would “hate watch” Kevin’s show. But a lot of people, both men and women also agreed with a lot of things Kevin said. He was very vocal on accountability and self awareness. He would talk about his failures as a husband and owning responsibility for it. He would always say that the term “high value man” was not just about money. It was about a man’s character and his usefulness to others. Yet almost 9 times out of 10 when women would call the show, they would constantly ask him how to get a high earning man making 6 figures+, that was 6+ ft tall, and some also asked for the man to be good in bed. Thats when Kevin would ask them questions about themselves, (height, weight, dress size, age, etc). Did they want to be married? How many kids did they want? He would then ask the women what % of men did they think made more than 100,000/yr. Almost all of them would not know the answer or would grossly overestimate the percentage of men in the US making that kind of money (its roughly around 10-15% or less ). If the woman wanted a black man, he would then ask what % of those 10-15% of men would be black, let alone 6 ft tall. His reason for this was to show that not everyone should be looking to get a man in that high earning range as that type of man is in high demand (i.e High Value) , but more realistically opt for men that would be more accessible aka an “average man”; making 40-50k or less but that has great character. A lot of men (and women) resonated with this message. However, some of these conversations would go off the rails whenever they would get too personal. Those are the ones that go viral. I can’t say if Kevin truly hated black women or not, but I do know that there are multiple shows where white women or women of another race would call in and say something that could be viewed as negative about black women and Kevin would shut them down from doing so. Also, before he died, he was in the middle of setting up a singles matchmaking type of event for educated single and childless black women seeking marriage with educated single and childless black men. The bottom line is that Kevin was polarizing: He had a very traditional view on heteronormative relationships in a 2022 world. He was a big proponent of “marry before you carry” and not to make babies with “ain’t shit men”. He would also tell black men to not gauge their manhood by how many women they can sleep with. To grow up, be serious and put on a suit and put away the sweats sometimes, and not to be do things to jeopardize your family. To me, it was no different than things i would hear from adults growing up. He just put it on YouTube and was more entertaining than everybody else at it. He would often say, if you don’t like his tone or how he delivered his message, then don’t watch him. I think out of all the things he’s said, I agree with that point the most. He would also say that if he was being disrespectful to a caller, it was because he was more than likely mirroring the energy he was receiving from the caller. Kevin did have a lot of bad faith callers, but he most definitely spiced things up for ratings. He had a lot of black male “incel” followers in the comments section that blamed black women for their inability to successfully interact and date with them. A lot of these guys go around self proclaiming themselves to be “high value” when they are far from it. Every now and then, Kevin would call those guys out and tell them that they needed to become the best versions of themselves to get better outcomes instead of blaming women for their lack of success in their dating life. But, he also had a lot of men of all races who praised him for being a voice for them in what they perceived to be a female dominated narrative on hetro normal relationships (i.e, “men are trash”, toxic masculinity, no scrubs, etc). But most of all what I found interesting, was the amount of female followers he was gaining. A lot of women would comment or call the show and say that he “saved their marriage by making them be more appreciative of what value their husbands provided in their lives”. For “telling them the harsh truth instead of telling them what they want to hear” (i.e. Steve Harvey, Derrick Jaxn). To be more realistic in their dating expectations based on your SMV (sexual marketplace value, another term he uses). And that “it is okay to desire to be a wife and stay at home mom” when modern society may otherwise frown on it. There would even be comments/calls from black women attributing their recent engagements to listening to KS advice.

   I have a lot i can say on this topic but this is already long as it is. I think the rise and untimely demise of KS says a lot about us as a society and what we chose to consume and to become outraged by. I personally think that while Kevin Samuels said a lot of wild shit, a lot of his advice was common sense if you removed yourself from it. But none of that matters if people don’t like how you made them feel no matter how much you say you are trying to help them. And Rod, you are completely right. People talk ill about the dead all the time if they don’t like the person, so all these guys talking online about they don’t speak ill on the dead are all capping…. I would have liked to see what Kevin’s true intentions were once he became more mainstream and what other ventures he would pursue. As you and Bossie stated on “this too much”, Kevin was a natural comedian and apparently a natural actor. His appearance on Atlanta was hilarious.

   -Suavy

   Ps. I understand if you chose not to read this. It’s long as shit.

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