The line between making jokes to alleviate sadness during a tragedy, and exploiting a tragedy for content is very thin one, and OnlyFans model Skylar Simpson is learning that lesson the hard way. The model staged and posted a false weather report to her channel, in which she posed in a pink bikini, and joked about the weather while being pelted with ice cubes. The storm she was cracking jokes about?
Hurricane Helene.
Yes, that Hurricane Helene. The one that broke land as a category 4 hurricane, and then decided to camp out in the mountains hundreds of miles inland causing widespread flooding, devastation, and death. The known death-toll has recently surpassed 160, and the number of unknown dead is… daunting.
The video that Simpson posted to her OnlyFans has received over 1.8 million views, and more than a little bit of criticism for her insensitivity to an ongoing crisis. The model has since apologized, and claims that she herself has family that has been affected by Hurricane Helene.
According to the public? Too little too late.
At the time of filming and posting, thousands of people were still trapped, and had already raised the alarm about missing loved ones, many of whom haven’t been found— alive or dead. Homes were being washed away, and entire towns were disappearing beneath floodwaters.
It’s no wonder that her video has received such widespread criticism.
Now that’s not to say that humor doesn’t have its place when coping with tragedy. Whomst amongst us doesn’t have that one friend for whom a gallows sense of humor acts as a load-bearing wall for their mental health? Many people resort to jokes when they’re processing trauma; but posting a comedic weather report laughing about a catastrophic event as it is actively unfolding qualifies as what those in the comedy world refer to as “too soon”.
Every comic— and more than a handful of OnlyFans models are comedians— will tell you that timing is everything when it comes to humor that is related to tragic events, and the timing on this particular oopsie of Simpsons was way off.
With large-scale devastation— the extent of which is still unknown— we think that maybe it might be a good idea to wait another minute or two before cracking jokes about Helene, and heads up to anyone trying to come up with comedic content surrounding hurricanes: another tropical system is already brewing in the Gulf of Mexico. Take a breath and maybe pick a different natural disaster, or skip the angry Mother Nature set altogether and take a whack at climate change deniers instead? Just an idea.
We hope that the next time Simpson decides to stage a weather report, that she’ll assess whether she’s actually engaging in satire— comedic commentary on actual events— or if she’s simply seeking attention, and should maybe pick a different topic to with which to gain views.
