Sam Hyde

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About

Sam Hyde is an Internet comedian who co-founded the sketch comedy group Million Dollar Extreme and rose to viral video fame after staging a satirical TEDx talk about wonders of the future at Drexel University in October 2013. In addition to his involvement in web comedy, Hyde has also gained online notoriety for his vocal advocacy of alt-right interests and being frequently misattributed as the possible "lone white gunman" suspect in a number of mass shootings and other gun violence tragedies in the United States. In early 2022, Hyde posted a reverse psyop against YouTuber iDubbbz. Also, Hyde entered Influencer Boxing in 2022 by becoming a co-owner of Happy Punch Promotions alongside Keemstar and adopting the alter-ego "The Candyman." He fought internet influencer IAMTHMPSN and won. After the fight, he humorously threatened Hasan Piker, adding to the growing beef between them. In 2023, Hyde launched Fishtank Live with Jet Neptune.

Online History

2013 TEDx Talk

On October 6th, 2013, the MillionDollarExtreme YouTube channel uploaded comedian Sam Hyde giving a nonsensical and buzzword-ridden lecture about "2070 Paradigm Shift" as part of the TEDX talk series held at Drexel University. Upon its upload, the video quickly went viral for its satirical jab at the ambiguous nature of the TED Talk topics and the pretentious mannerisms sometimes displayed by the guest speakers (shown below, left).

Million Dollar Extreme

In December 2007, Hyde co-founded the sketch comedy group Million Dollar Extreme (MDE) along with its two other members Charles Carroll and Nick Rochefort. Since its creation, the group has gained a moderate online following through a variety of risque monologues, comedy skits and public prank videos on YouTube, many of which have been described by its members as "comedy terrorism" and characterized by others as shock humor bordering on vulgarness and subversion. On May 7th, 2015, the comedy trio announced that they are working on a pilot for a live-action short sketch show titled Million Dollar Extreme Presents: World Peace on Adult Swim.

Adult Swim Cancellation

On November 14th, 2016, comedian Brett Gelman announced he was leaving Adult Swim, claiming that the company did not hire enough female showrunners and expressing distaste for greenlighting Million Dollar Extreme. Two days later, BuzzFeed^[19] published an interview with Adult Swim staffers, who revealed that many inside the network were trying to have the show canceled. On December 5th, 2016, the entertainment news blog Splitsider^[20] reported that Million Dollar Extreme had been canceled. That day, a post about the cancellation reached the front page of the /r/The_Donald subreddit, calling for a boycott of Adult Swim.^[21] The following day, Hyde tweeted that those who want the show to return should put "pressure on Turner" and that he would make an announcement video the following day (shown below).^[22] The tweet was subsequently deleted.

Donation to Andrew Anglin / The Daily Stormer

In June 2017, the far-right blogger Andrew Anglin of the Daily Stormer started taking donations to fight a lawsuit against the Southern Poverty Law Center, who accused the site of organizing trolls to harass a Jewish woman from Montana. Anglin managed to raise over $150,000 US, including a $5,000 donation from Sam Hyde.^[35]

Accusations of Abuse (Edie, Marky)

On October 29th, 2017, a lolcow.farm^[33] user started a thread sharing numerous screenshots allegedly from a post to 4chan by a transgender woman named Edie claiming to have dated Sam Hyde before (shown below, left). She offers screenshots as proof and claims she "face fucked" Hyde during a Chaturbate session once. On October 30th, another user posted an image compiling evidence and claims that Hyde once allegedly dated an underage girl named Marky. She was allegedly 15 at the time they dated and he took her virginity. The post also claims that Hyde was abusive toward her, showing evidence that he may have hit her in the face causing her to bleed (shown below, right).

On January 24th, 2018, another image was posted to the board where a woman named Charlotte makes similar accusations, alleging he cheated on her and acted abusively to past boyfriends (shown below).

On January 4th, 2021, a lolcow.farm user posted a screenshot to another thread^[34] on Sam Hyde sharing DMs and messages by alleged ex-employees of Hyde's claiming a variety of things, including that he didn't pay them, also alleging that he puts things up his butt (shown below).

Doja Cat Wears Sam Hyde Shirt

On October 6th, 2023, rapper Doja Cat posted a series of now-deleted selfies to Instagram, including a post to her Story, wearing a shirt that features Sam Hyde holding a gun that is often used in "Sam Hyde is the shooter" memes, garnering an unknown number of likes before it was deleted (shown below).

After deleting the post that day, purportedly due to backlash for supporting Hyde, Doja Cat removed the post and re-uploaded a cropped version of it to Instagram with the caption "🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄" (shown below, left).^[36] The Sam Hyde shirt gained viral spread that day, largely through posts criticizing her for support Hyde, who many consider to be a neo-Nazi. For example, on that day, X^[37] user @rapalert6 posted the photo, writing, "Doja Cat poses for a selfie wearing a shirt with neo Nazi Sam Hyde on it," garnering over 13,300 likes in three days. That day, X^[38] user @MFGROOT quote-shared the post, writing, "hey doja cat fans, welcome to the kanye west fan experience," garnering over 163,000 likes in three days (shown below).

Later that day, X^[39] user @ONSOMEPACSHIT posted criticism of Doja Cat, writing, "imagine being a pick me for incels… like doja cat is really trying her best to be cancelled and un-famous again just so she can get back to those racial chat rooms full time," garnering over 163,000 likes in three days. No Jumper host Adam22 defended Doja in a post to X,^[40] writing, "So sad she’s got an offensive/great sense of humor and is forced to hide it from the world," garnering around 1,700 likes in three days (shown below). Hyde posted a link to his merch on X^[43] that day, including the shooter t-shirt Doja wore, writing, "Extremely Fucking Hyper CHiked The Fuck Up RIght now. Fuck it," garnering over 3,000 likes in three days.

On October 7th, Insider^[41] and Rolling Stone^[42] reported on the story.

Reputation

"Sam Hyde Is The Shooter"

Sam Hyde has been a target of smearing campaigns carried out by 4chan's anonymous trolls and critics of his comedy, prompting his name to be invoked as a possible suspect in a number of major gun violence incidents across the United States since 2015, including the shootings in San Bernardino, California, Kalamazoo, Michigan, Hesston, Kentucky, Minneapolis, Minnesota, the Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs, Colorado, the U.S. Naval base in San Diego, California, the U.S. Air Force base in San Antonio, Texas, among many others. In July 2016, Hyde was once again falsely attributed by several European news outlets^[18] as a suspect in the shooting spree at a shopping mall in Munich, Germany, resulting in the largest spike in search queries of his name to date.

Sutherland Springs Church Shooting

On November 5th, 2017, a gunman opened fire at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, killing 26 people and injuring 20. That day, Texas Congressman Vicente Gonzalez stated that the shooter was "Sam Hyde" during a phone interview with CNN (shown below). Following the interview, Gonzalez was widely mocked online for falling for the hoax.

"It was reported to me that he's actually not from this community. Apparently his name was released as Sam Hyde, that was the name I was given."

Security analyst J.M. Berger tweeted his frustration with the hoax, saying "People, be better than this."^[23] Meanwhile, Mic staff writer Jack Smith complained about having to "write this explainer for the third fucking time" (shown below).^[24] Over the next 24 hours, several news sites published articles about the hoax, including The Daily Mail,^[25] Mashable^[26] and Mediaite.^[27]

Sam Hyde vs. iDubbbz

Sam Hyde vs. iDubbbz refers to a viral video posted on the HydeWars YouTube channel by Sam Hyde in which he shows footage gathered from a reverse psyop against YouTuber iDubbbz, which took place during 2021. The footage, as well as released supporting documentation, gives a glimpse at a much larger event that is still shrouded in mystery. Hyde was accompanied by the cast of HydeWars including rapper Joeyy.

Sam Hyde "Ghost of Kyiv" Hoax

Amid the 2021-2022 Russia Ukraine Conflict that escalated in late February 2022, memes were posted in regards to the Ghost of Kyiv, a Ukrainian Fulcrum pilot who had allegedly taken down six Russian fighter jets in 24 hours. In the end, the Ghost was revealed as a hoax. Before this realization, however, on February 25th, 2022, Twitter^[28] user RaulBrando tweeted a fake Breaking News-style meme that falsely identified the Ghost of Kyiv as "Samuyil Hyde," photoshopping Sam Hyde's face onto a picture of a fighter jet pilot. The tweet (shown below, left) earned roughly 5,300 likes over the course of three days.

As the Ghost of Kyiv trended on Twitter, some people believed the aforementioned tweet, the most notable being American politician and U.S. representative Adam Kinzinger. In a now-deleted quote retweet also posted on the 25th, Kinzinger praised Samuyil Hyde, totally falling for the bit. The tweet (shown below, right) was screenshotted and reposted by Twitter^[29] user bennyjohnson on the 26th, who captioned it, "This is how smart @AdamKinzinger is. He fell for a Sam Hyde meme," earning roughly 10,400 likes in two days.

Sam Hyde vs. Hasan "HansanAbi" Piker

On February 24th, 2022, Sam Hyde posted a tweet^[30] that some users found insensitive regarding the 2021-2022 Russia-Ukraine Conflict as well as the Death of George Floyd. In essence, Hyde was trying to make a joke about PC culture in general, predominantly relating to memes made about PC-infographic culture. The tweet (shown below, left) received roughly 5,700 likes over the course of four days.

On February 24th, Twitter^[31] user bobo_circus quote retweet the Sam Hyde tweet, captioning it, "is there like a sam jekyll whos funny," and earning roughly 24,800 likes in four days. The quote retweet was then liked by Twitch streamer Hasan 'HasanAbi' Piker (shown below, center) which prompted a response from Sam Hyde in a tweet^[32] that earned roughly 2,000 likes in three days (shown below, right). In the end, it prompted Piker to reply with, "fight me." The reply was later deleted despite Hyde making it his Twitter header.

Sam Hyde Boxing / "The Candyman"

Sam Hyde 'The Candyman' refers to Sam Hyde's boxing alter-ego "The Candyman," an Irish man with an accent a part of Happy Punch Promotions. In August 2022, Hyde fought TikTok and Instagram influencer IAMTHMPSN on DAZN and won. After the fight, Hyde called out Hasan Piker by humorously threatening him with a death threat, saying he was going to kill him, stalk him and wear his skin. Memes and discussions flooded Twitter on the day of the Influencer Boxing event.