I can’t do this as my own post for some reason, so I guess I have to leave it as a comment.
First of all, forgive any typos or formatting errors— I’m on my phone.
I’ve told the tl;dr version of this story in a comment to a post on this subreddit many months ago. I was relieved that my comment mostly stayed buried, but I still wanted to get it off my chest because at the time, I was pretty salty over the whole thing. In light of the recent veiled ‘accusations’ that have come out, I want to tell this story again.
Years ago, I sent NSP a message on Facebook. Yes, thirsty. Yes, a little embarrassing. At the time, I was considering moving to LA to pursue comedy writing, and 1) I genuinely thought NSP was great, 2) I wanted connections, and 3) I thought Dan was hot. So I shot my shot in the form of some silly dick joke. I wasn’t expecting my message to be seen, but it was, and Dan messaged me back. We exchanged pleasantries and banter, and continued to do so every now and then. Not a big deal, but it was nice to be noticed, I won’t lie.
Dan personally friend requested me on Facebook some time later. He would comment on a photo or post here and there. We talked online sometimes. He told me about Game Grumps, which I didn’t know anything about. I checked it out. I loved it. It felt like a friendship was being formed.
Months later, on his birthday, he told me he had a crush on me, and had felt that way for a while. I was so flattered, and excited, of course. We exchanged phone numbers, which he said he never did. We started talking every day. We sent each other videos. Phone calls, memes, cute messages, the whole nine. A lot of the time, he talked about NSP and how successful he was becoming. He referred to himself as a “rock star” regularly. It felt a little strange, but I always told him how proud and happy I was that he was living his dreams. At this point, I was very interested, and I felt like he was too. But this irked me— on more than one occasion, things that we joked about would end up on Grumps (which I was watching regularly now). Either he would says things that I had said, talk about links and funny things I had sent him, etc, but pass it off as his own thing. In fact, one particular thing I sent him ended up becoming a HUGE Grumps in-joke that I STILL see random comments about around the Internet. To be fair, I was credited that time, but to this day it still irritates me in an odd way.
We talked about plans to meet in a nearby state to my own, at one of NSP’s shows. I declined to go to the show because it felt very groupie-ish and weird to me, but I agreed to meet up with him that night, and spend the night with him. I did. It was a combination of sweet and awkward. After we slept together, he pulled out his laptop and asked if I wanted to watch the newest NSP video that hadn’t been released yet. I wasn’t all that interested, we just had sex for fuck’s sake, but we watched it. He said “you’re the first one that’s getting to see this!”. He sang along to the song. He talked about NSP. He ordered room service and hand-fed me dessert. He divulged personal things about other Youtubers— particularly one very popular one they were close with, saying that fame had gone to his head and Dan thought he was losing touch. Part of me wondered if Dan was talking about himself.
He fell asleep facing away from me.
I left in the morning. He didn’t kiss me goodbye, or touch me when we were outside of the hotel room.
After that, communication between us slowed down. We still messaged each other sometimes, but it became fewer and farther between. He would always say things like “I’ve been so busy living my rockstar dreams!”. He never asked what was new with me or how I was doing. I’ll be honest— I felt hurt. But at the same time, it didn’t surprise me that this was how it was turning out. I told myself I should have known better. I still believe I should have known better.
I would try to initiate contact with him, but most of the time it went ignored. He would pop in on rare occasion to ask me to come out and visit him in LA. He had just bought a house and told me he was excited to have a big shower with mirrors to “fuck in”, or a big bathtub, or something like that, I don’t even remember. I never came to see him. I figured it would just lead to me feeling used and shitty, since we didn’t really talk anymore, and he certainly didn’t put in any effort toward me on even on a friendship level.
I asked him once what had happened between us, and he said that he “forgets to reply”. Conversation halted completely after I told him I had gotten into a relationship.
Is my experience with him the WORST I could ever imagine? No. Is there the possibility that maybe Dan just wasn’t into me after meeting? Of course. Do I think the more likely scenario is that Dan is a fuckboy that does fuckboy things while wearing a “sweet soft boi” disguise? Yes. Do I also think that a lot of Dan’s fun little stories and jokes come from friends that are never credited? Absolutely. It really doesn’t sit right with me, when people get away with an act. I think Dan has gotten away with an act for a very long time.