The Dark Side of Baking Hacks: A Tragic Accident and the Blame Game

Welcome to How To Cook That, I'm Ann Reardon, and today we're going to be debunking a few more fake baking videos. If you're new to this series then it's a bit like the fakenews of the baking world... making up recipes that don't work or can't work just to make a viral video. We're also going to be looking at something today which is perhaps a lot more important, which is what if kids follow these hacks or baking recipes and something goes wrong and they get hurt, who's responsible for that?

One of my subscribers sent me a shocking story about a teenager, she's 14 years old with her 12-year-old friend who were following a baking hack. They were real fans of Ms Yeah's Channel, they tried to replicate one of her videos where she makes popcorn and it all went horribly wrong. The fourteen-year-old received burns to 96% of her body and died two weeks later in hospital, which is just awful. The 12-year-old girl is still requiring treatment for her burns.

Ms Yeah responded in a public statement on her Weibo page saying that these are the darkest days of her life. She has been publicly labeled a murderer and she has seriously asked herself 'am I an murderer did I cause her death?' She goes on to say that if they followed her video and did it exactly as she did, there would have been no danger, and she points out there are lots of other videos online that show a similar method. Let's just stop there and look at what actually happened in this situation.

Ms Yeah in her video uses a soda can and a tea stand with an alcohol lamp underneath it to make popcorn. I'm sure you've seen similar videos to this before. The police photo shows that the girls didn't use an alcohol lamp; they actually used two cans, and there are hundreds of videos showing how to use two cans to make popcorn. The main difference is those ones all use a candle underneath. In this situation, the girls decided to use alcohol for the heat source, and you can see in a lot of Ms Yeah's other videos she uses alcohol for the heat source as well, so they could have got the idea from there or they could have got the idea from somewhere else. There are other videos showing making your own alcohol burner for popping popcorn or for any other use.

So it's impossible to say with certainty where these girls got the idea of using the alcohol burner in the can. It could have been from Ms Yeah's video, it could have been from one of hundreds of other videos online. The danger came in when the flame wasn't big enough; they added more alcohol to the already lit burner, and the alcohol that you're pouring in the flame can just follow that back up to the bottle, which is what happened and then caused the bottle of alcohol to explode, which then puts flaming alcohol and soaks everything inside. Now I remember when I did the bombe Alaska video, I gave that exact warning... don't pour alcohol from the bottle or the flame can follow it up and cause the bottle to explode.

The reason I warned about that is this has happened before... it's happened when chefs have poured stuff at the table and then the bottles have exploded causing burns to all the people at the table. So it is dangerous, and just heed that warning. Ms Yeah went on to say in her statement that her videos are just meant to be entertainment for adults; they are not meant to be instructional videos for children, and although she believes that the accident was not based on the imitation of her video this tragic accident does make her deeply reflect on her own goals.

She says the Internet is not an adult internet; a large number of children consume it as an important information source, and she says I did not provide a good example... I'm sorry, I let everyone down. She plans to add more safety warnings in the future and will pay for the family's medical bills; neither of the girls' families can afford those medical bills but obviously that's not going to bring the fourteen-year-old child back.

So what if they did it exactly like it's in the video, and got harmed, whose responsibility would that be? So in the example like of the bleached strawberries that we showed in the previous video is that the responsibility of the content creator who put that up if a kid eats a bleach strawberry and gets sick or is it the responsibility of YouTube? I know several of my subscribers have raised this particular video as an issue, and every time has been: "It's just a silly mistake." But is it really just a silly mistake? Is it really just a matter of "oh well," that something bad happened because someone made a silly recipe?

What if the person who makes that recipe had not put that recipe up in the first place? What if Ms Yeah had never thought to make popcorn with two cans and an alcohol lamp underneath? Would we be having this conversation right now? Or would we just be making a simple recipe for popcorn, without any warnings or instructions about the dangers of using alcohol as a heat source?

This is not just about one individual's mistake; it's about the responsibility that comes with creating content online. As content creators, we have a duty to our viewers to provide safe and accurate information. We have a duty to be mindful of the potential consequences of our actions and to take steps to prevent harm.

But what happens when there are no clear guidelines or regulations in place? What happens when social media platforms are not held accountable for the content they host? This is where the question of responsibility comes in, and it's a complex one. Is it the responsibility of the content creator, or is it the responsibility of YouTube or other social media platforms?

I don't have all the answers, but I do know that this incident has raised some important questions about the role of online content creators and the responsibility that comes with sharing information with the world. It's a reminder that our words and actions can have real-world consequences, and that we must be mindful of the impact that we are having on others.

As a content creator, I am committed to providing safe and accurate information to my viewers. I will continue to strive for excellence in my recipes and my instructions, and I will do everything in my power to prevent harm. But I also believe that we need to have a broader conversation about the role of online content creators and the responsibility that comes with sharing information with the world.

We need to ask ourselves: what is our responsibility when it comes to creating content online? What steps can we take to prevent harm and ensure that our words and actions have positive consequences? And what can we do to hold others accountable for their actions?

These are tough questions, but they are ones that we must answer if we want to create a world where everyone can share their passion for food and cooking without fear of harm.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enWelcome to How To Cook That I'm AnnReardon and today due to popular demandwe're going to be debunking a few morefake baking videos. If you're new to thisseries then it is a bit like the fakenews of the baking world ... making uprecipes that don't work or can't workjust to make a viral video 💰 We'realso going to be looking atsomething today which is perhaps a lotmore important which is what if kidsfollow these hacks or baking recipes andsomething goes wrong and they get hurt,who's responsible for that? One of mysubscribers sent me a shocking storyabout a teenager, she's 14 years old withher 12 year old friend who werefollowing a baking hack. They were realfans of Ms Yeah's Channel, they triedto replicate one of her videos where shemakes popcorn and it all went horriblywrong. The fourteen-year-old receivedburns to 96% of her body and died twoweeks later in hospital which is justawful and the 12 year old girl is stillrequiring treatment for her burns. WellMs Yeah responded in a public statementon her Weibo page saying that these arethe darkest days of her life. She hasbeen publicly labeled a murderer and shehas seriously asked herself 'am I amurderer did I cause her death'? She goeson to say that if they followed hervideo and did it exactly as she didthere would have been no danger and shepoints out there are lots of othervideos online that show a similar method.So let's just stop there and look atwhat actually happened in this situation.Ms Yeah in her video uses a soda canand a tea stand with an alcohol lampunderneath it to make popcorn. I'm sureyou've seen similar videos to thisbefore. The police photo shows that thegirls didn't use an alcohol lamp they infact used two cans and there arehundreds of videos showing how to usetwo cans to make popcorn. The maindifference is those ones all use a candleunderneath. In this situation the girlsdecided to use alcohol for the heatsource and you can see in a lot ofMs Yeah's other videos she uses alcoholfor the heat source as well so theycould have got the idea from there orthey could have got the idea fromsomewhere else there are other videosshowing making your own alcohol burnerfor popping popcorn or for any other use.So it's impossible to say with certaintywhere these girls got the idea of usingthe alcohol burner in the can it couldhave been from ms yeah's video it couldhave been from one of hundreds of othervideos online. The danger came in wherethe flame wasn't big enough so theyadded more alcohol to the already litburner and the alcohol that you'repouring in the flame can just followthat back up to the bottle which is whathappened and then caused the bottle ofalcohol to explode which then putsflaming alcohol and soaks everything insight. Now i remember when i did the bombe alaskavideo I gave that exact warning ...don't pour alcohol from the bottle orthe flame can follow it up and cause thebottle to explode. The reason I warned ofthat is this has happened before ... it'shappened when chefs have poured stuff atthe table and then the bottles haveexploded causing burns to all the peopleat the table. So it is dangerous and justheed that warning. Ms Yeah went on tosay in her statement that her videos arejust meant to be entertainment foradults they are not meant to beinstructional videos for children andalthough she believes that the accidentwas not based on the imitation of hervideo this tragic accident does make herdeeply reflect on her own goals.She says the Internet is not an adultinternet a large number of childrenconsume it as an important informationsource and she says I did not provide agood example I'm sorry I let everyonedown. She plans to add more safetywarnings in the future and will pay forthe family's medical bells asneither of the girls families can affordthose medical bills but obviouslythat's not going to bring thefourteen-year-old child back or repairwhat's happened to the twelve-year-old. Ido think that in this particular casethat she is being unfairly burdened withblame and responsibility on this. If thegirls did follow exactly what she did inher video there wouldn't have been thistragic accident, however I think she'smade some good points there of kids arewatching this content even if it's beenmade for adult entertainment and notwith kids in mind, kids are stillwatching and they're absorbing likesponges and taking this into their brainas this is the way things work andthings work this way ... I can replicatethat and do that at home. So that bringsme to the question: what if they didit exactly like it's in the video andgot harmed whose responsibility wouldthat be? So in the example like of thebleached strawberries that we showed inthe previous video is that theresponsibility of the content creatorwho put that up if a kid eats a blecchstrawberry and gets sick or is it theresponsibility of YouTube? I know severalof my subscribers have raised thisparticular video as an issue and theresponse every time has been: \"It doesn'tviolate any of our policies if you don'tlike it don't watch it\" is basicallythe response they were given. I also haveasked about that particular video withmy contacts at YouTube and got the sameresponse ... it doesn't violate any of ourpolicies at all it can stay monetizedand it can stay on the platform ... which Iwas quite surprised about because Ithink that it could cause harm. So is theplatform at fault if someone gets hurt?I've got another couple of examples foryou today you guys have been justsending this one video to me again andagain wanting to know 1.) is it possible?and 2.) is it dangerous? That's the twoquestions I keep getting on this onevideo. So let's dive in and checkand see how it goes. First is it evenpossible? So if I put a werther's caramelon a fry pan on high heat after about 20seconds it starts to melt and then itstarts to burn and give off a putridsmoke 🤢That's gonna take a while to cleanthe pan. Attempt number two at medium heatafter waiting one minute it looks likethis and at two minutes it's still notcompletely melted but again it'sstarting to burn and we've got to cleanthe pan again. Attempt number three I'vegot this over very low heat and aftera long wait ten minutes to be exact tomelt one candy it was looking like itmight start to burn so I quickly plungedthe pan into cold water to cool it andonce it was cold I couldn't get it offthe pan. Now to be fair I wasn't using anonstick pan and it looks like they wereso that might solve that problem buteven so that is not the way to makecandy tuiles, it is a very ineffectivetime-wasting way and you're likely toburn the candy. If you want to make candytuiles just super quickly put them into afood processor and blitz them up or ifyou don't have a food processor put theminto a bag and bash it with a rollingpin - until you've got a powder. Then just puta small spoonful of that onto somebaking paper and bake it in the ovenjust keep an eye on it we're gonna takea couple of minutes for that to meltbecause you've got quite a fine layerthere. Pull it out leave them to coolcompletely and then you can just peelthem off the non-stick baking paper andyou've got these cute little candy tuilesyou can make them finer or thickerdepending how much of that powder youput on to your baking paper. Next thingthey do in the video is they pour meltedWerther's over a single beater that isspinning! The question I keep gettingfrom everyone is is that safe or is thatgoing to burn you and splatter caramelon you. I think that's a very goodquestion yes I think it's gonna splattercaramel whether it's gonna burn or not Iactually wasn't sure because that's likewill the caramel have cooled down enoughby the time it's been dripped down andflicked out to not burn you or is itstill gonna be hot? So we're gonna haveto do some experiments to figure outwhether this one's actually dangerous orjust messy. To test it out I've put my beatersinside a box and then I've cut a hole inthe top so that I can put the meltedcaramel in the top just like they didand then all along the front here I haveplastic food wrap so that we can see ifthe caramel burns through it or not.Plastic food wrap is surprisingly heatresistant ... if I take some over a bowl andpour on boiling water which as you knowwould burn your skin the plastic foodwrap doesn't melt, it's made to beheat-resistant. Good quality plastic wraphas a melting point of between 120 and140 C or 250 to 290 F. So well into thezone where you're going to burn yourskin before you start to melt theplastic wrap. Now in comparison crackhard candy is 148 C or 300 degrees F somuch hotter than the plastic wrap but asI said my question is is it going to becooled down by the time it's flungthrough the air so is it really gonnastill be that hot? Obviously it's thathot in the pan but what about once it'sflung off the beaches? I'm filming thisin slow motion so you can see what'shappening with the caramel WOW! that's abig splatter of hot caramel that wouldhave gone all over you if the plasticwasn't there. I don't know if you can seefrom this angle but it's made a hole inthe plastic wrap the whole way down andthis caramel fused and melted into thatplastic so I guess that answers thequestion of yes that caramel is stillhot 🔥 Let me film that a second time foryou, again this is in180 frames a second so it's much slowerthan in real life and that went rightthrough. Imagine that hot caramel stuckto your skin we're talking some seriousburns here! Anyone who's been burnt byhot caramel will know why I say it'slava hot it's hotter than hot waterevery time we're using it. So I want toknow there's a poll on this video let me know ... Iwant to know your thoughts is YouTubethe platform or Facebook the platformresponsible for allowing these videos tobe on their platform if someone getshurt doing this? Or is it the contentcreators fault or is it purely in theviewers or the parents if they'rechildren responsibility to actually dotheir own research before they followthese recipes. Most people I know sinceI've been making these say 'why wouldanyone make fake baking videos?' just thiswhole confusion this whole concept thatanyone would do that but it's all aboutgetting views it's all about viralityit's all about getting paid it's allabout money 🤑 and that's why people aredoing it they're making fake stuffbecause that's more shareable it's moreinteresting than real stuff becausewe've all seen how to make apple pie100 different ways and there's notmuch more new to do with that so they'veturned to faking it to get more clicksand more views. It's an interesting worldthat we live in. If you do get burnt byhot caramel 5-minute crafts comesinto play with this video telling uswhat to do...apparently you just put some toothpasteon it and that will soothe the hot burn!Colgate has actually put a whole page ontheir website dedicated to why youshould not put toothpaste on burns!They say the ingredients in toothpasteare not soothing, it contains abrasivesand detergents which work well forcleaning your teeth but not for easingthe pain of a burn. The American Academyof Dermatology which is skin doctorsbasically also advises not to puttoothpaste on burns because it can leadto infections. In case you don't actuallyknow what you should do if you have aburn or a friend has a burn if it's aminor burn run it under cool runningwater it doesn't need to be ice orsee cold water that can do more damageto the skin just cool water running fromthe tap just over it and keep it therefor quite a few minutes up to 20 minutesis recommended. Now obviously if you havea larger area or a deeper burn run thecooler water and then immediately callan ambulance and follow theirinstructions they'll tell you what to doover the phone. So that's been quite aserious video, apologies for that todaybut it is a serious topic and I thinkthat it would be interesting to knowwhat you think about responsibility andblame where that should land. I'mfascinated to wait and see the resultsof that poll and see what you think. Towatch more of my debunking videos clickhere. To watch some recipes that actuallywork click here. Subscribe to How To CookThat for more cakes chocolates anddesserts, if you want more debunkingvideos let me know and tweet me thevideos you want me to review. With thanksto my patrons who sponsor me every weekand make video is still possible on thischannel 💝. Make it a great week and I'llsee you on Friday.\n"