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At a young age, Marcel Eris got on the wrong track. He becomes addicted to drugs and temporarily homeless. When he discovered YouTube, he managed to turn his life around. Today he is Germany's most successful streamer as MontanaBlack. His videos are clicked millions of times. His book “From Junkie to YouTuber” in collaboration with WELT author Dennis Sand sold almost 130,000 times. Now the successor “From YouTuber to Millionaire” appears, in which he talks about his rise on YouTube and the downsides of his success. In this exclusive preprint he describes how he perceived one of his biggest shitstorms in 2019.
"Monte," wrote one viewer.
"Tell us again the story of the women and the dogs."
It was Friday night, just after 9:00 p.m., and all hell was going on on my Twitch stream.
I had around sixty thousand viewers, obviously in a good mood and just had a lively discussion with my community on the subject of loyalty.
A discussion that made the chat glow.
So the story with the women and the dogs.
And then I got to the dog thing.
A classic Monte picture.
MontanaBlack
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The story wasn't actually a story at all, it was a comparison.
A parable in Monte style.
And it went like this: I told people what my picture of relationships was.
Back when I had my very first girlfriend, I was insanely jealous.
It was almost sick.
I spied on her constantly, always suspecting that she might be cheating on me with some other guy, and opened a huge barrel over little things.
I was an idiot then.
Because I didn't even notice how much my stupid jealousy was ruining our relationship.
How much I gave my girlfriend at the time a reason to distance themselves more and more from me.
Basically, it was my own behavior that broke the relationship.
That I lost my first great love.
Jealousy is a terrible thing.
It can bring out aspects of a person that he himself does not know he even has.
Dark sides.
So I tried to convey to my audience that mutual trust is the cornerstone of a healthy relationship.
I am still convinced of that.
As someone who has been betrayed himself in his past, I know that there is hardly a worse feeling in the world than to be so fundamentally deceived by the person you love most of all.
Cheating on someone in a relationship is the last thing.
But being constantly afraid of being cheated on, not trusting your partner anymore, is just as bad.
Because it destroys a relationship.
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So much for what I wanted to say.
And then I got to the dog thing.
A classic Monte picture.
Women, I said, women are like dogs.
If you treat them badly, if you keep them on a short leash, if you forbid them to do things, then they will never develop a healthy relationship with you.
Then they'll just run away at the next best opportunity.
But if you give your partner the freedom she needs, if you see her as an independent person who is not your property, if you just let her do her thing, give her the opportunity to develop as she desires holds correctly, only then do you really have the chance to have a relationship on an equal footing.
Because you take your partner seriously as a person.
And the partner feels taken seriously as a person.
And then I drew the comparison to a dog that the short leash also makes insecure, that never trusts itself or others and that will run away at the first opportunity if you just keep it chained and consider it property.
Monday's word for Sunday.
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I had put this comparison on the Twitch stream a few years ago, so some viewers remembered it.
I actually found the picture quite appropriate and hoped that some viewers would take my statement to heart.
And they did.
I got a lot of positive feedback that evening.
It was a good stream.
At least that's what I thought.
When I checked my cell phone the next morning, I saw that apparently not everyone was so happy with what I said yesterday.
I had an unusually large amount of negative messages in my mailbox.
I quickly found out why that was.
Someone had posted an excerpt from my stream in which my statement was extremely shortened.
It was actually broken down to just one sentence: "Women are like dogs".
But we were living in a time when a crisp quote was often taken out of context, so I thought nothing of it.
If people looked at the entire excerpt, they would understand what it was meant to be.
A mistake.
There it was again, this assumption that others should understand me.
And it was their job to deal more with me if they hadn't already.
I think there were a lot of people who didn't belong to my community, who got a bad image of me because they understood my words differently.
A lot of people came to this who deliberately wanted to misunderstand me.
Who wanted to push me into a corner that I don't belong in.
Because that matched her preconceived notions about me.
"Disgusting sexist," some commented.
“Misogynist” and “misogynist” the others.
I did not understand.
I really didn't get it.
It's good that the comparison, that the picture I chose was perhaps a little flippant, I'll gladly admit that.
But how could you interpret my basic statement that every man should give his partner the freedom she needs, because please say that I was a misogynist?
That was absurd.
But I didn't take it seriously either.
They were just some irrelevant Twitter knights who wanted to bask in their supposed moral superiority.
Another mistake.
By now I was quite a shit storm
MontanaBlack
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I took a deep breath and massaged my temples.
I didn't really want to do that to myself.
But well, just get it over with, Marcel.
Nothing helps.
I clicked on the link and read through the article that felt like a thousand people had just emailed me.
"... MontanaBlack started a heated Twitter debate with a tasteless comparison.
Because: He compares women with dogs. "
I hit my desk and closed the tab again.
"What a mess, Digga!"
Feels like everything and everyone reported about it.
And my cell phone didn't stop vibrating either.
"Yes?"
"Monte, are you still sleeping?"
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My business partner Dennis was on the line.
"No," I said.
"I'm awake."
"Have you seen the article yet?"
"Which one do you mean?
There is a lot of choice. "
I googled my name and looked at the search results for the past twenty-four hours.
The question was rather who hadn't reported about it yet.
After all, there were some media that presented the facts fairly and also conveyed my actual presentation reasonably well.
But of course I also knew that for the vast majority of people only the headline would get stuck.
And the headline was: "MontanaBlack compares women to dogs".
"Don't worry," said Dennis.
"That'll be over in a few days."
"Yes, as always."
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By now I was quite a shit storm.
I knew the dynamic.
She was always the same.
Someone got upset, the topic was boiled up for a maximum of a week, and after that nobody spoke about it because the next sow was driven through the village.
I turned off the computer and went into the kitchen to get another iced tea from the fridge.
As I passed my front door, I heard noises from the hallway.
I lived in a house with few parties, so that was unusual.
I opened the door to see what ...
"Hello, Mr. Eris, would you like to give us an interview?"
A bright camera light blinded me.
It took me a few seconds to orient myself.
To understand what was going on here.
There were three people in my hallway.
One pointed an oversized television camera at me, the other held up a boom, and a young woman held her microphone in my face.
"Now turn off the camera!" I snapped at the guy.
What was that kind of thing?
You could have just asked me for an interview, why the robbery?
My mood wasn't getting any better, but at least the guy took the camera down and the headlight no longer blinded me.
"Look, Mr. Eris," said the young woman.
“The whole internet is talking about her.
And we thought it would be only fair to let them have their say instead of just reporting on you, wouldn't it? "
There she had a point.
Nevertheless, she could have just written an email.
"Which station are you from?" I asked.
"RTL."
Marcel Eris in his old apartment in Buxtehude
Source: dpa-infocom GmbH
Admittedly, an email would not have been of any use.
I would not have given any interviews to RTL either way.
I knew the form of reporting on the station.
"I'm not going to give you an interview," I said and was about to close the door again when the reporter held it open with her foot. "Give us a chance," she said.
“Tell us how you meant your comparison.
We'd like to understand it, otherwise we wouldn't be extra ... here ... what's that called again? "
"Buxtehude," interjected the cameraman.
"... exactly, otherwise we wouldn't have come here to Buxtehude."
"Okay," I said.
"I offer you that I have a background discussion with you.
I am happy to answer your questions.
But not in front of the camera. "
The three TV people watched each other, then the young woman agreed.
"Wait outside, I'll let you know," she said to her team, and I let her into my apartment.
I offered her something to drink and then sat down with her at my glass table in the living room.
“How did you mean that with the women and the dogs?
Do you think I am a dog too? "
"Of course not," I said calmly, explaining the analogy again.
Explained again that I only wanted to express that you have to give your partner freedom.
That jealousy and the need to control are the death of a relationship.
"That actually sounds quite reasonable," said the RTL woman, who now didn't seem as excited as she was just now.
"The excerpts that we saw on the Internet didn't seem so ..."
"Because you've probably only seen excerpts instead of the entire statement from me."
“But that will be the case for most of the people, Mr. Eris.
Most have only seen the section and now consider you a bad sexist. "
I shrugged and lit a butt.
What have I not been taken for?
For a sexist, for a racist, for a money-hungry rip-off ...
“So it would be good if you could tell people exactly what you just told me in front of the camera.
To straighten your image in public. "
The journalist was really very ambitious.
"I'm sorry," I said.
“You are welcome to rotate your report, I have now explained all the background to you.
If you continue to think I'm a sexist, please.
If not, I will be happy to see a fair report.
But I won't say anything in front of the camera. "
Then I slammed the door behind me.
What assholes!
MontanaBlack
Then I took the lady to the door.
"What a shame," she said contrived in the hallway.
"Then of course the question now arises how your grandparents will find all this?"
"Look," I said.
“Report what you want.
I don't give a shit.
Say what you want about me.
I don't give a shit.
But I swear to you, if I catch you standing in front of my grandparents' door with your camera team, something bad will happen! "
"You want to threaten us?"
"Yes," I said very clearly.
“My grandparents have absolutely nothing to do with this.
These are older people.
Don't you dare harass them. "
Then I slammed the door behind me.
What assholes!
I called Grandma and Grandpa and told them not to open the door if some camera team were to ring their doorbell.
But luckily my announcement had made an impression after all.
Or maybe the journalist still had something of a conscience.
When I left the house, the next reporter was already at my door.
This time a freelance journalist with a cameraman.
He held his iPad in front of my face, with which he was already taking a picture.
“And that's the man half the internet is upset about right now.
MontamannBlack or as it is called in real life ... "
“Listen, you asshole” I interrupted his announcement, “first: MontanaBlack.
Second: You are filming my house right now, this is an invasion of my privacy.
If this recording is published and you leak my home address with it, I will sue you for everything you have. "
Then I got into my S-Class and drove off.
The guy jumped into his BMW and drove after me.
That could not be true!
He actually drove after me.
What was that supposed to mean?
For a brief moment I was reminded of some documentary about Hollywood stars who couldn't leave the house without being constantly besieged by paparazzi.
Something like this had never happened to me before.
I gave a little more gas.
(...)
That plunged me into huge self-doubt.
How many months could I still be?
MontanaBlack
I had already realized during my last shitstorm that I had become a figure in public life.
That the range also came with a responsibility.
That I could no longer take the inside jokes that my community understood for granted.
Yes, my audience checked my humor.
But meanwhile it wasn't just my audience watching.
Meanwhile, people were watching who didn't know me, who didn't know what I meant certain things.
And when they weren't watching, they heard or read something or saw snippets on Twitter that made me look like a fool.
But the dog comparison?
That something like that was enough to bring people to the barricades, that something like that was enough for me, my family and friends to be ambushed with camera teams in Buxtehude?
That plunged me into huge self-doubt.
How many months could I still be?
Did I have to completely slander myself in the future?
Marcel Eris and Dennis Sand: MontanaBlack II: "From YouTuber to Millionaire" (Riva Verlag)
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