(A letter from TomatoSmosh to fanbases everywhere)

I have seen only the tip of the iceberg of people who are saying that they are boycotting Smosh until they “speak up about issues” or because they don’t like a particular cast member etc.

Is this really the world we want to build? One where people cannot have their own beliefs (which everyone will always have, whether spoken or not), and cannot stand up for what they believe in without being “cancelled”?

Our world is so disconnected and dismal and ridiculously graceless and merciless and it’s so ugly to see. It’s ugly that this is what we’ve become.

1. None of us are so all-knowing that we should ever think that our personal opinions or what we see of things or believe of things is the 100% be-all-end-all truth. To abandon humility is to abandon humanity. To penalize someone for their personal beliefs is a ridiculous thing. Whether they are Mormon, Christian, Hindu, Jewish, Buddhist, etc.

2. You can love people you disagree with.
Even in the case where someone acts apart from the truth, or apart from what we believe, we cannot just go and wish them dead or curse their whole group of friends for still being friends with them.

The graceless world we are building by acting this way is the graceless world that will trap us in our own imperfections and be our exact downfall.

None of us is perfect. and I mean none of us. Not me, not you, not them, not anyone on God’s green earth is a perfect, sinless, unblemished person.

Even the people you love (and possibly especially the people you love) will let you down.

To turn on people because you suddenly learn that you disagree with them is the exact reason that our world is in such deep turmoil.

You can love the people you disagree with.

You can want healing for the world and be kind to your enemies.

You can, and to not is only to build a world of hate.

It is ridiculous how people who have claimed to love Smosh, who have been fans of Smosh, who have supported Smosh when Smosh agrees with them suddenly has a dire disdain for them the millisecond that Smosh proves to be human like the rest of us.

Human and imperfect. If we cannot love people when they are imperfect, or when we disagree with them, we literally cannot claim to love at all.

I cannot even count on two hands the ways I disagree (even in big ways) with many of the cast members, including the ones I absolutely adore.

But my disagreement with beliefs or opinions will not and should not ever remove from me or my discourse or my actions the unconditional love that makes humanity beautiful, makes it heal, makes it survive or which builds a world that has a chance to thrive.

The absolutely conditional way that I have watched so many people treat other people is saddening. It’s quite honestly disgusting.

We say we want to heal the world, and then we wish dead the people who don’t bow down to the gods of our own opinions. As if we ourselves are perfect gods whose opinions are the only that have any meaning or truth or goodness to them.

I know that many people will hate me for speaking out about this.

I know that, because I’ve seen the way so many of you have treated an entire company with so much conditional “like” and then sudden disdain.

We cannot and I legitimately mean cannot build a world where we disown people the second they are not who we wanted them to be; the second they are not carbon copies of ourselves; or the second we arrive at the discovery that they do not think the exact same way we do as if our brains are what houses the collective “good” of the entire universe and anything that strays from it is to be put to death.

We are selfish to think that we should ever be the standard of perfect, worthy, or good. We are foolish to think that we are any sort of god that our opinions are what should be the law, or what constitutes the law of perfection.

Despite being utterly discouraged by the way this fanbase has absolutely lacked humanity to such a degree as boycotting a company they “loved” two minutes ago, I have no right to be shocked, because this is what humanity is. It’s imperfect. Being shocked does not give me a right to hate any single one of you, and so I don’t, because it would be stupid to hate someone for disappointing you.

We are humans.

Humans are quite literally built with the tendency to constantly disappoint. Human beings are disappointing, because they are imperfect and sinful and individual (which means differences simply are commonplace).

You cannot expect perfection of literally any human on earth, including yourself.

This is a letter to express my deep sadness with the way that this fandom has reacted. Not even any of you should be held to a standard of perfection, but we can do far better than this. And we should do far better than this. You cannot control other people, you should not wish to control other people. The only person you can control is yourself, and to act out of hate is only pouring hate into the world through the one channel you can control. And you simply cannot build a better world when you react with hate towards everyone you disagree with.

This is a letter asking you to remember this: Nobody can reach a standard of perfection. Holding anybody to a standard of perfection will (and seriously will) lead to utter disappointment and acting out in such ways as all of you has.

People always prepare to cancel anyone. Even people they love (and even people they know nothing of). And this is a ridiculous and dismal way to live.

All of you expect perfection and melded agreement to your beliefs as the conditions for loving or showing kindness or even human decency or dignity to anyone, and this means we will forever live in an absolutely loveless world. A world devoid of the capability to love, to heal, and to thrive.

I’m for real encouraging all of you to rethink the negligent ways you approach other people, even in general. Conditional “support” and “love” is neither of those things at all.

We cannot all be walking on a tightrope of perfection knowing that we will be fed to the wolves the second we do a thing a single degree away from perfection as pictured in the minds of the people who hold the dogs.

Even the ways you treat each other, I’ve seen it, and it isn’t kind. The cliques, the gossip, the pettiness, the payback, the cold shoulders, the whispers, the side-eye. This is the world you are building, and the world you are building is the one you will live in. You cannot expect to lay bricks of anger and then be upset when the world is walled in by anger. You cannot be angry to receive what you deal. You can’t wish for other people to change without changing yourself. You simply cannot. Not if you actually, genuinely, seriously want the world to actually, genuinely, seriously be a better place.

You literally cannot think you can build a world with hate and then expect it to be full of love. The same way you cannot lay yellow bricks and expect them to be blue when you look at them.

All I am saying is take a look in the mirror because none of us, none of you, not me either will ever be perfect or “uncancellable” and if we live in a world that cancels everybody the second they prove to be human and fallible we will live in the exact world we do now: dismal, disconnected, graceless, and full of anger, hate, and depression.

Build a better world, and that starts with you. It starts with me. It starts anybody who will make the effort to lay a brick other than hate. More than that, stop throwing the bricks and start actually building with them.

Be better than this. None of us can be perfect, but we can control ourselves from acting out of hate. And that’s what we need to do to make the world a better place. Even for yourselves, if you want to look at it selfishly.

The silent treatment will not make positive change. Yelling at people in the comments will not make positive change. Demanding that they think the same way as you will not make positive change. It has to start from within you, not with the conditions being met that will make it pleasant for you to treat other people nicely.

It will never be pleasant to love people with real, genuine human care. That’s why it’s harder to be nice than it is to be mean. That’s why it takes control to reign in anger. And that’s why you have to realize that if you only love people when it’s pleasant or easy or convenient to you, you aren’t actually loving anybody at all.

You will not ever make a better world by hating every person for being different than you are.

You have to learn to expect to be disappointed by humanness, because that is simply the truth of being human.

That doesn’t mean that you have to not disagree. It doesn’t mean you have to change your beliefs. It doesn’t mean that you have to people-please or be what other people wish you were. You can disagree, you can stand for what you believe in, but you can’t go throwing bricks at people who think differently than you. You can’t expect other people to be what you want them to be. You can’t expect other people to want to please you. That is not what will change anything for the better. It’s toxic and hypocritical to expect anything different than this.

That will only build a world full of hate and disdain and further war.

Build a world of love. You’re the one holding the brick. Decide what to do with it, but realize that it has genuine consequences and whatever you do with it affects the world around you with either hate or love – there is zero in-between. And only voices of love will ever produce love. Only actions of love will ever produce love.

And in case any of you forgot, like and love are not equal. You do not have to like someone to love them. Love is not inherently romantic. Love is not what constitutes “like”. Love is the action of unconditional human care – consideration of dignity. Love is selfless. It’s always selfless. Love, by nature, cannot be selfish. If it is, it isn’t love.

Like I said, you’re the one holding the brick. Act accordingly to what you genuinely want for the world.

Love is hard sometimes, but it’s worth it, even if it doesn’t feel that way right now.