The Sickos: The real sacrifice behind living vicariously Instagram: sickosWhile browsing through YouTube, it\u2019s easy to fall into the never-ending rabbit-hole of globetrotting vloggers living it up in a different country each week. Their lifestyle seems so easy by comparison; they party \u2019til dawn in nearly every video, see amazing sights, and are presumably paid incomprehensible amounts of money to vacation all the time and upload their travels to the internet. This theory might be true for some creators, but it isn\u2019t the case for a YouTube group known as the \u2018Sickos\u2019 \u2014 although looking at their channel, one might think at first glance that these YouTubers benefit from the same golden goose that has cozied up to the rest of their peers. Who are the Sickos? The Sickos are a group of childhood friends who\u2019ve managed to stick together through adulthood, collectively deciding to flip the bird at ordinary life in favor of traveling the globe to pull off the occasional life-threatening stunt a la Evil Kenivel. Hailing from Hood River, Oregon, each of the guys in the Sickos are athletes at heart, having grown up among a number of geographical landmarks fit for such hobbies as kiteboarding, surfing, skiing, hiking, and more. Watching their videos is like watching a hardcore episode of the Travel Channel. In each video they\u2019re somewhere new (right now, they\u2019re in the Swiss Alps), taking on some impossible feat \u2014 think of creating a giant rope swing on a naturally-occurring stone arch in the middle of the ocean with a jet ski. Each video is an adrenaline-inducing thrill ride with close friends, who have collectively labeled themselves as \u201cprofessional fun-havers, full-time psych masters, and absolute kooks.\u201d Nearly two years after starting up their channel in February 2021, the Sickos have managed to accrue over 99,000 subscribers \u2014 as well as rub elbows with some major names like rapper Yung Gravy, who managed to save their skin after a brawl at a Barcelona nightclub went sour. With some of their biggest uploads hitting half a million views, it\u2019s clear that this group has the potential for greatness, and they\u2019re already well on their way\u2026but the path isn\u2019t always full of sunshine and roses. Traveling the world isn\u2019t as easy as it looks With such a busy schedule, it stands to reason that most casual viewers would think the Sickos are funded by a rich parent, or are at least paid handsomely for their unique content by various brands or sponsors\u2026 but that simply isn\u2019t the case for these Hood River natives. Although some of the Sickos have side hustles (with a few owning their own brands of merch and surf boards), only one of them has a full-time job that allows him to work remotely. The others in the group scrape by to save up for their next trip, and so on and so forth. Unfortunately, not everyone knows this, and the Sickos have experienced their fair share of criticism from unwitting viewers lashing out at their presumably lavish lifestyle. \u201cIt is really hard,\u201d Charlie (the self-described \u2018weirdo\u2019 of the group) said of the criticism. \u201cI don\u2019t wanna say it\u2019s frustrating for us, but we get a lot of comments like, \u2018It\u2019s daddy\u2019s money,\u2019 or \u2018These kids are only making it because their parents are rich.\u2019 It\u2019s not that it discredits us, but it definitely hurts the soul a little bit when you\u2019ve been grinding, trying to figure out how to make $3,000 so we can make the next part of the video series happen. But thankfully we\u2019re getting to a part of our channel now where enough money is starting to come in, where we don\u2019t have to worry about that as much.\u201d \u201cIt was really brutal at the start,\u201d Kaden (the group\u2019s \u2018dad friend\u2019) added. \u201cWe were extremely broke. Everybody was just scrounging for money. Eating rice and lettuce, whatever we could possibly do. It was brutal.\u201d Luckily, the Sickos operate with a positive mindset and have, as a result, managed to foster an extremely uplifting and enthusiastic community of fans. Scrolling through the comments, most viewers are excited for their upcoming ventures and are very complimentary toward the YouTubers \u2014 something they say has changed from their humble beginnings when hardcore members of the surfing community took issue with their videos and stunts. \u201cFor every one, minor criticism or negative comment, there\u2019s a thousand of the real homies commenting positive stuff,\u201d they said. \u201cThat\u2019s our people. For every negative comment, there\u2019s a thousand positive ones. That\u2019s the headspace that we live in.\u201d \u2026but that didn\u2019t stop their parents from trying to ward off the negativity in the early days. \u201cEarly on, in our first videos whenever we\u2019d get mean comments, our parents would fire back,\u201d Kaden admitted. \u201cMy mom sacrificed many hours online battling the haters,\u201d Jackson added. Flying high while high-flying The Sickos\u2019 bread and butter is their stunts \u2014 think bungee jumping from a 190-meter tall bridge in the Swiss Alps or crafting a 50-foot slip-n-slide that gets serious air. It\u2019s what makes up the fabric of the Sickos\u2019 collective identity as content creators, and it\u2019s an integral part of their lives, too. That being said, there\u2019s always an inherent amount of risk involved with these stunts \u2014 something the Sickos are highly aware of. According to the bunch of bffs, they always take risk into account, citing Will (the prankster friend and resident \u201cbookworm\u201d) as their unofficial stunt coordinator. \u201cIt\u2019s a pretty spicy subject,\u201d Charlie said of the topic. \u201cIt can be pretty dangerous, but we\u2019ve been doing everything for so long, and we\u2019re pretty calculated people. I honestly feel like we\u2019ve never put us, or anyone, at serious risk. We know the risk going in.\u201d \u201cWill\u2019s a bit of a bookworm and he\u2019s always really dove into the idea of safety and has engineered our ideas and keeps us safe,\u201d Kaden assured. With that being said, the group claims they haven\u2019t had any major brushes with danger despite their long resume of wild physical feats. However, they did cite their jetski-powered rope swing as their most dangerous stunt, noting how Max nearly landed head-first on the edge of the jetski, which was idling a little too closely to his landing spot in the water when he fell from the air. \u201cThat was sketchy, because that was a miscalculation,\u201d they said. \u201cNormally, there\u2019s nothing to hit, but we were filming from the back of a ski and that was close, and that could have been pretty bad. We\u2019ve had a lot of bad jet-ski accidents. It usually involves a jet-ski.\u201d Started from the bottom Although the Sickos might not have always been scoring sick barrels across the world, they\u2019ve been interested in film from a very young age \u2014 something they say acted as an inspiration for their current pursuits. \u201cAlways, since we were little kids, we were running around with cameras and filming each other doing stuff long before YouTube, long before putting it anywhere,\u201d Jackson explained. \u201cAnd then we always talked about doing a movie, and it evolved through jobs, and then YouTube itself.\u201d \u201cEveryone was pretty into filming, and so our whole original idea to make a movie,\u201d Kaden added. \u201cWe always wanted to make a movie type thing, like a film almost, and then Jackson got his YouTube job with Jamie, and then Jackson got into YouTube, and so everyone was kinda like, \u2018Oh, maybe YouTube episodes are a better option than making a movie.\u2019 It kind of evolved.\u201d Now, the Sickos are living life to the fullest while trying to build a YouTube empire at the same time. Considering the sheer amount of people involved in their channel, on top of being best friends, it might be reflex to think that these relationships might suffer under their business arrangement \u2014 but for this group of guys, they claim it\u2019s actually quite easy. \u201cI think we took a really smart approach from the beginning,\u201d Charlie said. \u201cI think I speak for everyone when I say that we noticed, most times, business with friendships fall apart when people arent on the same page from the start. We just made sure everyone had a clear idea and understanding of how things are gonna work and everyone is on the same page from the very beginning. We all bicker with each other, but it\u2019s like brotherly love at this point.\u201d Celebrities, Yung Gravy, and Netflix shows The Sickos\u2019 travels saw them bump into American rapper Yung Gravy during a stint in Barcelona, who helped them recover a camera SD card they lost during a scuffle with security at a night club. (It\u2019s unlike the Sickos to get into trouble \u2014 although they do credit the NELK Boys and Jackass as their content inspo.) According to Forest, the group got to know Gravy through their connections with other influencers on top of a connection closer to home: Their own friend and another member of the Sickos, Cale. \u201cOur friend, Cale, is a TikTok dancer and got a job working for Yung Gravy, and he came to Barcelona with us,\u201d Forest said of the encounter. \u201cAnd we were hanging out with Kale and were like, \u2018What if we got Yung Gravy to be in our video?\u2019 So Cale reached out to Yung Gravy and got him to help out with the video, and that\u2019s kind of how that ended up.\u201d Although the Sickos don\u2019t have any other celebrity connections they could tell us about, we did broach the topic of their viewers requesting them to get a Netflix show \u2014 something they\u2019re open to, if the possibility arises, although it\u2019s not necessarily their cup of tea compared to what they\u2019re able to do on YouTube. \u201cWe don\u2019t ever want to say no to any opportunities right off the bat, we\u2019d just have to know the specifics of everything,\u201d Charlie said of the idea. \u201cI think there is something great about making your own content and the limitless reach that YouTube has. I think it\u2019s really fun for us to put out a video and see how many people we can get to watch it, and you don\u2019t have that satisfaction I imagine on Netflix or HBO.\u201d The Sickos\u2019 content is especially unique in that it feels a bit like a sitcom mixed with their real-life adventures, something that YouTubers say is central to their identity. \u201cWe look at it like, it can be an episode out of a TV show. A YouTube channel is just about a vlog, but we look at it like it can be an episode out of a TV show like \u2018Friends,\u2019 and that kind of ties it into this \u2014 going from wanting to make it a movie, to now we\u2019re making a YouTube show, but the two are still super intertwined.\u201d The Sickos are still just getting started, but it\u2019s clear they have the drive, knowledge, and community to make their dreams come true to one day become those YouTubers who don\u2019t have to worry about scrounging up enough change for their next big trip. Until then, it\u2019s onward and upward \u2014 and there\u2019s no telling where their travels will take them next.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Sickos: The real sacrifice behind living vicariously Instagram: sickosWhile browsing through YouTube, it\u2019s easy to fall into the never-ending rabbit-hole of globetrotting vloggers living it up in a different country each week. Their lifestyle seems so easy by comparison; they party \u2019til dawn in nearly every video, see amazing sights, and are presumably paid […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-60379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60379"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60379\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}