And you think your neighbors are bad

At one time or another, we've all had bad neighbors. One of the worst I ever experienced was a pair of brothers who, years ago, rented the unit upstairs from us. One went to Babson; one went to BU. One drove a Mercedes; one drove a Porsche. They were rich, entitled, spoiled brats who spent more time partying and tootling around in their pricey rides than they ever did in class.

They were only above us for a year, but during their time with us, they must have hosted a dozen parties for their equally entited rich, entitled, spoiled brat international student friends. Nothing like a bunch of drunk, smoking young folks tromping around outside your door, screaming at the top of their lungs, the girls destroying the marble hallway by clomping around in super-high heels. And you haven't heard loud until you've heard Europop blasted high enough to reverberate through a 160-year-old building. 

We would lodge a complaint, and one of the brothers, usually the older one, who was the more diplomatic, would fake apologize. Until the next episode. 

I haven't thought of the M Brothers in years, but they came to mind when I read about a group of young guys who'vemoved into a quiet LA neighborhood and begun raising havoc.

Neighbors originally speculated that they were a tech startup. Otherwise, how could they afford to rent in the tony neighborhood of Bel Air?

While I would argue that one look at these dudes would disabuse anyone of the notion that they were techies, it did, soon enough, become apparent to the neighbors that they were mistaken about the nerd factor.

Cuz yo! A round-the clock frat party was running - complete with chug-chug-chug chants, paintball games, vomiting and (it goes without saying) no attention paid to social distancing  - hosted by "members of the Sway House, a collective of TikTok and YouTube influencers."

The group, which has been called “the One Direction of TikTok,” is made up of several creators famous for their party-boy antics: Bryce Hall, 20; Jaden Hossler, 19; Josh Richards, 18; Quinton Griggs, 17; Anthony Reeves, 18; Kio Cyr, 19; and Griffin Johnson, 21. They are one of several collab houses that have cropped up all over Los Angeles in recent months. But while most of those groups are tucked away in secluded areas on the outskirts of the city, the Sway House is in the middle of a swank residential neighborhood and has made life for the people who share the block a nightmare. (Source: Boston Globe)

Seventeen? Eighteen? Don't these boys have parents? 

Maybe, maybe not. 

But they do have a manager. 

“To our knowledge there have been no formal noise complaints,” said Warren Lentz, CEO of TalentX, who manages the house’s members and provides them with the house in exchange for content. “We have been in frequent communication with both the LAPD and city counsel to ensure the safety of the neighborhood. In order to follow proper protocol, we hired security for our clients and the house.”

Ah, content.  

Back in olden times, when the word content was used, there was some weight to it. Content had to tick at least a couple of these boxes: important, meaningful, thoughtful, interesting, original...

I toook a quick look at the "content" provided by Kio Cyr and Quinton Griggs, who each have 1 million+ followers. It appears to be entirely made up of pics/vids of themselves (sometimes with a bikini'd blonde on the arm) looking playful, or soulful, or whatever they're trying to look. Apparently, it's never intelligent. Because if that's what they're shooting for, they're abject failures. 

Vapid is the word that springs to mind.

To say that I find their look completely unappealing is to state the obvious. To further state the obvious, of course, they could give a flying fuck whether they appealed to someone 70 years old. 

But even back in the day when I was part of the demographic they're broadly aimed at, I wouldn't have liked them. 

I crushed on Adam, the brainy son on Bonanza, rather than Little Joe, the cute one. Needless to say, my favorite Beatle was iconoclast John Lennon, rather than cutie-pie Paul McCartney. (If I had a do-over, I might go with George Harrison.)

But that was back before we had influencers...

What Sway House boys are influencing, I'm not quite certain, but they're influencers nonetheless. And making a lot of money at it.

Meanwhile, their neighbors live in fear and loathing.

“There’s an undercurrent of fear and intimidation both from all the stories in the media about people getting doxxed, swatted, harassed, especially if you’re a woman, which many of these neighbors are who are dealing with this stuff are,” [neighbor Amit] Runchal said. “With fans and actual people mistakenly showing up to our houses, there’s a virtual and a physical threat.”

At least we never had to worry about the M Brothers having a million followers harrassing us.

Anyway, Sway House and other nincompoop influencers have done one thing for me. They've given me the will to live long enough to see what these dopes do with their adult lives, if they make it that far.