Tweens! What are they thinking? What apps are they using? What drugs are they doing? Who are they voting for? Technically no one, because that’s illegal — but Obama doesn’t care. As with everything else in life, he just wants the tweens to like him. And to accomplish that, he’s going to be interviewed by three tween-approved YouTube stars in the days following his State of the Union address. Really.
The lucky internet personalities who get to probe the President of the United States with questions include one solid choice and two semi-questionable ones. Renowned nerd and generally funny smart person, Hank Green, is the former. After all, he’s known for breaking down complicated topics, illuminating important issues, and otherwise attempting to inspire a thirst for knowledge in America’s tween-y youth.
Then we have GloZell. A comedian whose more popular videos include her doing the cinnamon challenge (seen above) and the video below.
A curious choice, but sill semi-understandable. GloZell’s husband is an Army vet, after all. But then we come to Bethany Mota. One of the more popular of YouTube’s hoardes of teen makeup reviewers. Here’s Bethany on what it takes to look cute after gym class:
Bethany gets to spend 10 minutes with the man responsible for running the country. Great.
Each of these stars will get their own, personal sets in the White House from which they will conduct their own, separate interviews, which will include questions amassed from all walks of social media. According to Buzzfeed, “The administration is able to see potential questions posted to open social media portals, but has no say in which questions are selected and will not vet the questions asked by the hosts.”
For the record, we think it’s great that the White House is trying to reach out to the younger demographic. Even if they can’t vote, it may at least help them to start even remotely caring about politics. But if these were really the best we could do of all of YouTube’s endless tween-approved idols — god help us all. [Buzzfeed]
Picture: Chris Person