Benjamin Gleason / @benjaminiscrazy

About

Benjamin Gleason, also known by his username benjaminiscrazy, is a TikTok creator most known for his Zoomer, TikTok E-Boy appearance despite his old age. He has grey hair, a beard and face tattoos, and often makes thirst trap style videos where he lip dubs music from artists like Lil Peep. He started posting content in 2021 and has since grown a following. Memes about him center on his age, and reactions to his content center on cringe and members of Generation Z seeing themselves in him.

Background

Benjamin Gleason was born on June, 9th, 1986, making him 35-years-old as of February 2022. He lives in upstate New York and is a musician, specifically a guitarist. He once stated in a now-deleted TikTok that he makes a living off multiple passive incomes, one of them purportedly having to do with growing marijuana. Gleason also struggles with both drug addiction and borderline personality disorder, something that he's vocal about on his social media outlets.

Online History

Gleason started posting to TikTok sometime in early 2021 under the username benjaminborderline. However, his earliest accessible video on the platform was posted on June 23rd, 2021,^[1] and it features him gazing into the camera while the song "Cigarette Daydreams" by Cage the Elephant plays in the background. Over the course of eight months, the video's received roughly 2.2 million plays and 602,900 likes (shown below).

As a precursor, however, Gleason started a YouTube^[2] channel before his TikTok, created in September 2011. However, he didn't start posting to it en masse until his viral success on TikTok, starting most notably in late 2021.

TikTokers reacted to the video above in large numbers after it appeared on many users' For You pages. Most TikTokers in the comment section were young women, referring to him as "Daddy" in reference to being attracted to him. He continued to post content in the same, front-facing camera style going into the rest of summer 2021. For instance, on September 10th, 2021,^[3] he posted a video that received over 3.4 million plays in five months (shown below, left). On September 19th,^[4] he posted a video that answered a comment about his age, receiving roughly 312,300 plays in five months (shown below, right). He revealed in the video that he's 35-years-old.

His first TikTok to reach close to 10 million plays was posted on October 18th, 2021,^[5] wherein, he lip dubs the song "SAD!" by XXXTentacion, earning roughly 9.8 million plays and 2 million likes over the course of four months (shown below, left). One of his more notable TikToks posted in late 2021 was one of him responding to a commenter who asked, "who broke you grandpa." It was uploaded on November 3rd, 2021,^[6] and received roughly 3.1 million views and 526,400 likes in three months (shown below, right).

Highlights

Comparisons to Hasan Piker

As early as Gleason's first TikTok, he drew comparisons to notable Twitch streamer and YouTube personality Hasan "HasanAbi" Piker. Many online thought that Benjamin Gleason looked like the older version of Piker, joking that he is Piker in 20 years.

The comparison received increased attention after a tweet was posted by Twitter^[7] user chooglaze on December 21st, 2021, that captioned a benjaminiscrazy TikTok with, "hasan after day 47 of libtard media censorship." The tweet (shown below) received roughly 5,400 likes over the course of two months.

In January 2022, Hasan Piker watched and reacted to benjaminiscrazy TikToks live on stream. A 10-minute clip from the aforementioned Twitch stream was uploaded to YouTube on January 22nd by the channel HasanAbi Industries, amassing roughly 1,000 views over the course of one month (shown below).

I "Heart" Latinas T-Shirt

On January 22nd, 2022, Benjamin Gleason posted a TikTok^[8] that featured him wearing a pink T-shirt that read, "I ♥ Latinas," while the song, "Star Shopping," by Lil Peep played in the background, earning roughly 1.5 million plays and 278,500 likes over the course of one month (shown below).

On February 3rd, the TikTok shown above was reposted by Twitter^[9] user cutec0p, earning roughly 2,100 likes over the course of two weeks. On February 18th, Twitter^[10] user paddingtonrocks quote retweeted cutec0p's tweet, captioning it, "hasan piker in 20 years," and earning roughly 37,000 likes over the course of four days. More Twitter users started using the image of Gleason in the t-shirt in their own tweets, like Twitter^[11] account BrailledFOTW, who posted a screenshot on February 18th that earned roughly 3,700 likes (shown below).

Search Interest

External References