Jessica Kent: Make It Make Sense (Part 2)

Part 2 of my series on the downfall of Jessica Kent, a prison reform and addiction / recovery YouTuber with over one million followers. Part 1 here.

Jessica Kent during the halcyon days of prison nacho recipes and advice on how to make creative use of bodily cavities to conceal contraband. I'm not about shaming people for trying to look their best, but in the beginning, Jessica swore that she wouldn't fix her crooked teeth because "they're a part of who I am." It was in some ways a red flag, then, when she pursued Invisalign, a boob job, and other cosmetic enhancements as her fame grew and her persona became more "gangster."

In Part 1, I mentioned the tale of the Gordian knot. I should've explained it then, but frankly, I didn't have the time or the wordcount. I'll give you the Walmart version now.

In ancient Turkey, there was a knot tied to an oxcart. This knot was so complex that it was puzzled over by mystics and philosophers, stoners and engineers.

The snarl was so formidable, in fact, that it was rumored that whoever could untangle it was destined to rule all of Asia.

Along came Alexander the Great, the son of a Macedonian king who would create one of history's greatest empires, which stretched from Greece to northern India.

Alexander the Great was challenged with the Gordian knot. He took one look at it, withdrew his sword from its scabbard, and sliced through the knot with one fell blow.

In doing so, of course, he demonstrated the kind of boundary-defying brilliance that ignores expectations, that embraces iconoclasm, that makes its own rules.*

*Though he knew well the power of brute force, Alexander the Great wasn't a barbarian. He was undefeated in battle, true, but he paid homage to the gods of the peoples that he conquered; he fused Greek and Asian culture to create a stable foundation for his empire.

Of course, I don't have a sword. I'm no Alexander the Great, anyway.

I originally intended to publish a single piece on Jesica Kent. However, when I arrived at the maximum practical wordcount and I still hadn't come close to wrapping up my thoughts, I took the easy way out and promised a Part 2.

I've been putting off Part 2 as I wait for my Alexander the Great moment - only to decide that it was never to arrive. There's just so much to learn from this fiasco that I've got to pick a random loose end and start untangling from there.

Appearance vs. Reality

We all know that what we see on social media doesn't represent reality.

Our digital culture is rich with truisms like "Don't compare your day-to-day to someone else's highlight reel."

But in the case of Jessica Kent, it was so much more than that. It was more like "Don't compare the face that you see in the mirror first thing in the morning to someone else's expertly crafted mask."

Almost every single part of the life that she depicted was a lie.

I remember the early, Wild West days of the Internet. During computer lab in seventh grade, I stumbled across a blog about how to have a romantic relationship with a dolphin.

The Internet was a strange, unfettered place in those days, when true anonymity seemed to exist. At the time, the only motivations for creating content were self-expression and connecting with / entertaining others. People let their freak flags fly.

Social media, likewise, was used primarily as a means for connecting with others and expanding one's worldview. MySpace and the other early social networks were the ultimate pen pal hack. I can vividly remember the tingle-thrill of finding my first e-friends from exotic countries like Trinidad and Tobago.

Today, the online world has become so boundlessly, nauseatingly commercialized that polish supersedes presence and substance. Algorithms have acquired godlike omnipotence in shaping our digital behavior.

In one fashion or another, almost everything that we see on social media these days is a lie.

Who Succeeds on Social Media?

Succeeding on social media involves the marriage of luck and skill.

Physical beauty, particularly of the feminine sort, can also play a significant role.

There is technical knowledge about digital systems involved; there is certainly business acumen that comes into play in monetizing social media success, as well.

But the more that I reflect on Jessica Kent's story, the more that I realize that social media success tends to elevate a certain personality profile: People who are unhealthily dependent on external praise; people who don't play by the typical social rules, who aren't afraid to disclose thoughts and experiences that go shockingly far into what an "average" person would consider TMI territory; people who well understand how to manipulate others' sympathies and exploit their vulnerabilities.

Very often, the people who venture online in search of connection and validation are the people who lack these elements in real life, which creates a dangerous disconnect that incentivizes dishonesty.

In the real world, building the life of our dreams is an arduous, long-term affair. Online, we can achieve it - or at least simulate it - overnight.

From a psychological standpoint, many of the people who succeed on social media are Cluster B personalities. And even if people don't start off as borderline or antisocial or histrionic, they might very well have their personalities warped by social media fame until they begin manifesting these behaviors.

It's a Black Mirror episode about an algorithm that poisons personality, except that it's our reality.

At one point while I was living in China and watching YouTube was my main way to connect with a recovery community, I realized that almost all of my favorite addiction and recovery creators maxed out at around 10K to 40K followers.

This was no coincidence. These were people with full, balanced offline lives who used honest strategies to grow small, stable followings over the course of several years. They didn't make it beyond that point because they weren't willing to engage in the sensationalism, ever-intensifying histrionics, and other dishonest tactics necessary to.

Another way to express this is that in many ways, Jessica Kent is not the exception. She is the rule.

YouTube maven Trisha Paytas benzo'd out, binge eating, and blubbering hysterically on her kitchen floor. I believe that this was when she originated her enigmatic yet eternal post-breakup line: "I feel like a chicken nugget."

In China there is a not-so-ancient saying: "Five thousand years of culture reduced to this."

Social Media Shouldn't Be Anyone's Primary Job

I will die on this hill.

Unless you're an Only Fans creator making 1.5 million USD a year and banking 90% of your take-home for 3+ years, social media is not going to provide for you for the rest of your life.

At the height of her social media clout - depending on which online tool for estimating creators' earnings you use - Jessica Kent was making somewhere around a quarter million USD per year (pretax).

All the usual caveats apply. We know that giving a substantial amount of money to someone who isn't used to that rarely results in long-term net gain of wealth. People who win millions in the lottery end up broke in short order.

My mom once represented a man who was released from New York State prison after serving years on a wrongful murder conviction that was overturned based on DNA testing. After release, he won a slam-dunk lawsuit worth several million dollars against the state.

Just a couple of years later, he was calling his trial attorney's office to ask if he wanted to buy a Bentley for a few hundred dollars.

The very first thing that Jessica should have done when she received that $10,000 check for a million views from YouTube was retain a financial planner.

Instead, we know from the receipts from this mess that she gave generously and spent lavishly as her life imploded until she was cash-strapped once again. She was used by the people around her; she had no comprehensive financial strategy; and she made the deadly mistake of assuming that things would continue to get better forever.

$250,000 per year for two years - a half million total - isn't that much in current dollars when divided by the 40 years or more that you're likely to live post-social media fame. And it is the nature of the beast that almost no one stays on the top for very long.

But forget about the financial side of things. We need outside careers to keep us tethered to reality, to avoid succumbing to our own hype.

The praise of hundreds of thousands of people is a drug as powerful as a speedball. It takes an extraordinarily grounded, humble, and wise person to avoid letting it go to their head.

As I've suggested above, such individuals rarely swallow the social media lure in the first place, let alone do so hook, line, and sinker.

So, we end up with figures like Jessica Kent and Trisha Paytas at the top of the YouTube hierarchy. They're driven to ever more extreme behavior to keep the clicks coming in, but from day one, it's a losing battle.

At one time, Jessica Kent's diagnosed Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD) was at least quiescent. Contrary to popular belief about borderlines and sociopaths, even severe personality disorders can go into a kind of remission.

It seemed that prison time had beat Jessica into submission. There's no shame in that; plenty of us learn the important lessons the hard way.

Furthermore, to her credit, it seemed that something really did change in her with the birth of her first daughter. Jessica wanted to give her daughter better than what she had growing up, and she was willing to say goodbye to an entire identity and way of life to do so.

Jessica and Reece were engaged and moving into their dream home in the Chicago burbs before YouTube money came into the picture. Everything wasn't perfect - it never is - but her daughters had a stable, two-parent home with a mom who was around to care for them all day.

That is so much more than many people have. In fact, it's everything.

Jessica Kent threw it away for an illusion.

Social Blade stats for Jessica Kent as of May 28, 2024. Pay attention to the estimated yearly earnings - down to about 50K from around 400K at the height of her clout. Because most of these numbers incorporate prior success, they paint a much rosier picture than reality; the truth, which Jessica Kent has acknowledged, is that the "drama" has hurt her reputation and earnings significantly.

The Value of YouTube Content

The psychology of productivity teaches us that the people who are most deliberate about how they spend their time are the ones who succeed.

When I think back on the many hours that I spent watching Jessica Kent videos, I have a weird "what remains?" response.

What did I really get from all of those videos?

My first response is that Jessica gave me a backstage pass to a prison subculture that I wasn't particularly familiar with and that I found intriguing.

Except that isn't really true. I've spent quite a bit of time in treatment with men and women who have done serious time. I've heard their stories in a more in-depth way and within a more personal setting.

What's more, I worked for a prison reform nonprofit for a year before I left for China. In my own small way, I helped contribute to bail reform measures, problem-solving courts for addiction and human trafficking, and the effort to close Rikers Island.

I guess that the more accurate answer is that I got entertainment from Jessica's videos.

In many ways, the quality of Jessica's content was low. She wasn't a particularly eloquent speaker; she didn't draw on data to connect her anecdotes to the wider picture. Moreover, the vast majority of her prison reform and addiction / recovery content had been pioneered by Christina Randall and other creators before her.

However, Jessica had charisma, and she knew how to tell a story. In particular, I appreciated the colorful cast of supporting characters who populated her prison tales - like the "hot shot" meth addict who perpetually waved her arms above her head to beat off birds that no one else could see or the seasoned convict granny who taught the newcomer girls how to make a special dessert out of French vanilla coffee creamer.

I suppose that there is value in this type of prison reform and addiction / recovery content because it can appeal to the masses in a way that the more rigorous, nuanced, data-driven, and specialized material won't - at least not in the beginning. In other words, it can awaken an interest in people who wouldn't otherwise have these topics on their radar.

But the supreme irony of Jessica Kent's story is that she went from being an exemplar of rehabilitation to a case study on why people find it hard to believe that addicts and criminals can ever really change. That undermining of people's belief in redemption, in my opinion, is the worst consequence of Jessica Kent's actions.

Before her YouTube career took off, Jessica was poised to enter some sort of prisoner support services career. She had an outstanding warrant in Texas to clear up first, but I am certain that she would've eventually been cleared to speak to prisoners.

Imagine the impact that she could have had - not on a general audience made up largely of Zoomers, many of whom watched her videos out of lurid fascination - but on the women who were a few steps behind her on the path to getting their lives back on track.

Jessica could've convinced them of the endless small pleasures of having an ordinary, functional life; the beauty of healing intergenerational trauma through responsible parenting; the sustainable pleasures that come from delayed gratification and the peace that comes from atoning for selfish acts.

Again, even from the standpoint of pure entertainment, when I think back on her content now, I'm underwhelmed.

To put things into further perspective, I'm currently reading a novel called Red Rabbit by Alex Grecian. It's a magical realist tale that takes place in a Wild West filled with witches, demons, and ghosts. The characters are electric and the language - you could get drunk on it.

And this is, in some ways, an unremarkable contemporary novel; it's not like I'm reading great history or timeless fiction at the moment.

From this standpoint, the time that I frittered away watching Jessica Kent videos on YouTube feels wasted - like the entertainment equivalent of McDonald's.

I'm getting old. I have books to publish and more to write.

Do I really want to follow any creators on these new media platforms anymore?

A Warning for Content Creators

Even though I am a "content creator" in the most modest sense, the Jessica Kent Affair - which I am styling after the Dreyfus Affair - has been a wake-up call for me.

When I began blogging two months ago, I had a list of fairly ambiguous goals centered around "sharing my story."

But starting to create content with the goal of sharing one's story is like entering medical school "to help people."

With a few notable exceptions, the best, most fulfilled doctors are the ones who know exactly what specialty they want to end up in from the beginning. This knowledge helps to guide them, ground them, motivate them; to manage stress and to create reasonable component goals.

A task as Herculean as American medical school shouldn't be undertaken without a highly specific vision of where it's going to lead.

Social media content creation as a non-hobby undertaking is the same.

Without clearly defined, finite goals, we put the algorithmic monster in charge. We end up worshipping at the altar of clicks rather than building a small to midsized, stable community made up of people who are interested in what we have to say for the right reasons.

In my case, I've winnowed my lengthy list of initial aims down to three:

(1) To provide information that helps people to understand the science of addiction / recovery and to navigate the inpatient / outpatient treatment systems, the 12-Step Programs, the world of psychiatry, and other aspects of recovery;

(2) To use this blog as a sort of proof of concept for the two books that I am in the process of querying (to demonstrate that I have interested readers who appreciate my style and content, that is);

(3) To organize a group of addicted people and other stakeholders to petition to change the outdated, draconian U.S. methadone regulations (see Metha-Don't for some of my thoughts on this subject).

After those three goals are attained, if they ever are, I'll re-evaluate.

One Last Point: Recovery Is IRL

I saved the most important point for last.

I follow quite a few addiction / recovery creators on various platforms, and I love to view their inspirational content. In particular, I really enjoy viewing before / after and sobriety birthday pictures where you can see the miracle at work, as they say in the Program.

If I have five minutes of free time at the end of my lunch break, it beats scrolling through advertisements for things that I don't need, I suppose. And there is real value in this content in terms of its ability to reach people who are in untreated active addiction and who might be considering quitting drugs and alcohol.

But I've noticed a dangerous trend lately. A couple of influencers on my radar are selling an app with the tagline "I couldn't stop drinking until I downloaded this app..."

Perhaps for a non-alcoholic whose drinking has gotten a bit out of hand during a time of stress, an app such as this will be helpful. But no app - whether for peer coaching, Suboxone maintenance, group therapy, or whatever - is going to keep a true addict or alcoholic clean and sober for the long run.

All addicts are consummate liars. This is true even when we don't mean to be deceitful because so much of the disease involves lying to ourselves. As anyone who has ever deceived themself for an extended period knows, this kind of lying gets away from you. The brain starts bypassing the middleman - that executive function that allows you to decide whether you will lie or not. It learns the "hack" of stating reality as we wish it would be rather than reality as it is.

I have no doubt that Jessica entered into this state of pathological deception at some point during her relapse. She displayed all of the inconsistencies and cognitive dissonance of someone who is desperately trying to believe their own lies, to "make it all make sense" in a way that doesn't sacrifice ego.

This is why it's imperative to have some regular recovery supports in real life. Words are wind, but eye contact, appearance, emotional affect, and a hundred other subtle indicators add up to tell the story that we might be trying to hide.

Once you've been an addict, you'll never miss the signs in others ("you spot it, you got it" is one of my favorite NA / AA sayings). I have rarely been surprised when someone who I've gotten to know in recovery tells me that they've relapsed; the warning signs are unmistakable (this is why the Program works, after all).

No one can tell how we're doing from behind a computer screen.

If Jessica had had people in her real life who questioned her, who urged her to reach out to in-person recovery supports, things might have gone very differently. She had changed herself for the better in major ways in the past; logic says that she could've done this again.

Instead, Jessica was hired to represent treatment and recovery services when she was the last person on Earth who should've been guiding anyone else in recovery.

Most of the true recovery leaders who I know, who are some of the most interesting and resplendent souls on this planet, have no time for social media because they are out there doing the work every single day in real life.

Sure, it can be great to share our recovery struggles and victories online, but we can never depend on e-recovery to keep us clean. Recovery from addiction simply doesn't work that way.

Final Thoughts (Don't You Have Somewhere You Should Be?)

I admire those bloggers who can open with an engaging anecdote, meander at a comfortable pace along their stream of thought, and then bring the reader to a conclusion that wraps things up so artfully and decisively that it seems self-evident, like the only possible final chord for the symphony.

Unfortunately, I'm not one of them. I almost always gain great insight into my thoughts and feelings while writing a piece such as this one, but very often this does not translate into the sort of clarion conclusions that lend both reader and writer a sense of closure.

I have picked and picked at this Gordian knot. It feels endless; there is just so much here to untangle. About social media. About falling back into addiction and other harmful behaviors. About character and change and how way leads on to way, as Robert Frost once put it.

It doesn't help that I'm a Millennial; I've been steeped in postmodernism almost from the womb.

If I had to boil this whole dispiriting saga down into a single life lesson, it would be to stay humble.

Kindness can make us vulnerable and shield others from unpleasant truths that they may need to hear; goodness is a philosophical question, ever up for debate; even honesty and transparency have their caveats attached.

But you can never go wrong with humility.

And it's not just a virtue; it's a practice.

I go to 12-Step meetings partly because I need to remind myself of how badly I've hurt other people through my awful, selfish decisions - those caused or fueled by my addiction and those independent of it.

As uncomfortable as it is to remind myself of this fact, I mustn't forget that I once caused a car accident while driving under the influence of opioids and benzos.

I hit another car, and I could have killed the person in it (she was uninjured, which is both fortunate and surprising considering the extent of my injuries).

I can't ever let myself forget that. I don't want to, and I don't deserve to.

Humility could've prevented Jessica's descent into megalomania and saved her and her daughters incalculable grief.

I stand by what I said at the conclusion of Part 1, namely, that Jessica Kent has a tremendously human, broadly applicable, and very powerful story to tell about what social media success does to a certain type of personality with a certain sort of past.

I don't think that we'll ever hear it from her, but I hope that I am wrong.

Grass. Go touch it.

If you enjoyed this series, you might want to check out my review of Cat Marnell's autobiography How to Murder Your Life and my piece on the Soft White Underbelly YouTube channel.