A California guard has become a social media star after a video that showed him staying calm whereas being berated with insults on Thursday went viral.
The incident happened at VidCon, an annual convention for YouTube
fans and content creators, which occurred at the Anaheim Convention Center
from June 21-24,
2017. Within the video, 1st uploaded to YouTube on June 22 and later posted to
Twitter by VidCon attendant John
Hill with subtitles, Joseph Hernandez, a guard, is seen in his yellow and black uniform standing guard at a
door following a physical altercation between
some attendees and security.
In the video, Hernandez and his colleague Sergio
Castillo ask the group to stand back just
as a young man identified
later as Christian Burns begins asking Hernandez, “What is wrong
with you people?”
Burns, who has been brought
up as an “Instagram
model,” continued,
“I’m famous, and
you’re not, so you
listen”.
Hernandez responded, “That doesn’t make you any better than me.”
Burns’ confrontation continues for an additional minute as he
insults Hernandez, shouting, “You’re blue collar as f*ck,” and
“You ought to kill
yourself.”
NBC News has reached out to Hernandez concerning the incident.
On Saturday,
travel vlogger Louis Cole
found Hernandez at the convention center and apologized to Hernandez on behalf
of the YouTube community.
Cole also tweeted a video of him with Hernandez and asked his 877K+ Twitter followers to assist spread the word to get Hernandez’ Instagram account 100K followers — a response to Burns’ comments that he was a lot famous than Hernandez.
“Let’s show Joe however we respond as a community to the abuse he had to deal with,” Cole tweeted.
As of Monday afternoon, Hernandez currently has over 66K
followers on Instagram, together
with his posts receiving thousands of likes and comments from individuals thanking him for
staying calm despite the harassment.
Burns’ original Instagram account has since been
deleted.
VidCon is presently in its eighth year in California, and attracts thousands
of creators and fans from around
the world for the four-day convention. Since last year’s fatal
shooting of singer Christina Grimmie, who got her begin on
YouTube, VidCon workers has
been outspoken concerning increasing
security for the annual event.
In a video posted to YouTube, Hernandez and Castillo said they were simply doing their job and that they’ve endured
harassment before.
“This wasn’t the primary time I’ve been yelled at by somebody who thinks they’re better than me because of their cash,”
Hernandez said.
On Sunday, Hernandez and Burns spoke for the primary time by phone throughout an interview with
Keemstar, who hosts
“DramaAlert” on YouTube, where Burns
apologized for the incident.
“I’m extremely sorry. i
was literally in a very bad place at that
point. I was stressed out. I took this out all on
you. I lashed out. I was a little bit intoxicated throughout that whole thing so I’m not saying that’s an excuse however I kind of wished to clear things up,”
Burns said, adding it wasn’t meant to be directed toward Hernandez.
“You kind of did direct it toward me,” Hernandez responded. “Ultimately, at the end of the day, you’re a human being too. You made mistakes.
And although it sounds crazy that I’m being so forgiving, that’s the sort of attitude i would like to come off because I’m a forgiving person.”
Both Hernandez and Castillo have posted on Instagram and Twitter
since VidCon ended and inspired individuals to treat each other with respect.
“Remember: no bullying, be positive,
treat everybody alike.
We’re all equals here,” Hernandez said in an Instagram
video on Saturday.
“No bullying,” Castillo echoed.
“That’s not something that’s
cool.”
According to Hernandez’s Instagram Stories, he
and Castillo were up early following day after VidCon ended for another day on the
job.