YouTuber's fake pregnancy stunt sparks debate on online authenticity

A 20-year-old YouTuber returned after a year-long break with the news that she is pregnant. A few weeks later, it turned out that this was not true.

In April of this year, 20-year-old YouTuber Caroline Konstnar announced that she was pregnant. She described the video with the news: "Yes, the rumours are true. I am pregnant... very excited to use this baby to boost my stats".

Caroline Grossman started posting on YouTube in 2019 when she was 15 years old. Her pseudonym, "Konstnar," means "artist" in Swedish. The YouTuber created comedy video sketches and recorded song parodies. Her latest, "For free?" about a foot fetish, was published in March 2023. Since then, her channel has been quiet, until she posted a video about being in the late stages of pregnancy.

Two weeks after she showcased her pregnant belly, Konstnar uploaded a video titled "I lost the baby". "Lost" in this context is primarily read as "lost" the child. However, it can also mean "misplaced" the child. The frame that is the cover of the video shows a tearful YouTuber, suggesting that she indeed had a miscarriage.

However, the video opens with a scene where a concerned Konstnar is searching through kitchen cabinets, looking for the "lost" child. The YouTuber says: "Okay, I lost the baby and I don't know what to do. I don't exactly know where I put it". Moments later, she confessed: "I am not pregnant". She added: "I'm sure some of you are shocked. I'm sure some of you are not at all surprised. Some of you may not care, but some might be asking why the hell did you lie about it?".

In a lengthy monologue, the YouTuber broke the fourth wall by discussing the nature of content creators' relationships with the audience. She stated, "When you're a content creator, the line between entertainment and reality is very blurred." She emphasized that viewers get attached to an image created by creators, who are anonymous individuals whose attention has financial value.

Konstnar argued: "I lied about being pregnant as a joke. The joke wasn't that pregnancy in difficult circumstances is funny. The joke wasn't that the audience was naive enough to believe that I was pregnant. The joke was that you got attached to something that wasn't real and I became something that isn't real. We all come here over and over again to find connections and we really don't find them".

The most popular comment under the Konstnar recording is: "If you're angry at Caroline, then you must be new here". However, some people did not find her joke funny at all. A few thousand liked the ironic comment: "All the single mothers who poured their hearts out under the first video are in for a really nice surprise".

Although Konstnar offended some of her audience, the video in which she revealed her pregnancy was fake garnered over 200,000 views in one day. Despite the calculated clickbait, there are still subscribers who are interested in her content. Her channel has over a million followers.