Olodo Uprising: Are We Rewarding Authenticity or Ignorance?

Some time ago, the First Lady of Nigeria said we should start selling akara and corn. The next thing everyone did was dust their ring light, set up their tripod and start making content around the topic. And honestly, this is one of the things that annoys me about Nigerian social media. Everybody wants to go viral. Whether the topic makes sense or not, whether you actually have anything to say or you’re just forcing yourself into the conversation, once something is trending, everybody suddenly has an opinion. And it has gotten to a point where it feels like the most senseless content gets the most attention. Do something shameful? Boom, you’re viral. Fight with somebody? Viral. Cry on TikTok? Viral. Say something completely ridiculous with confidence? Millions of views. But go online and talk about your academic achievement, teach something useful or share something genuinely informative and see how hard you will fight to get 200 views. Then you complain about it and somebody will say: “At least they have money.” And this statement genuinely irritates me. At least they have money? Okay… and? Since when did having money become a substitute for intelligence? Since when did being financially successful mean we should stop questioning someone’s character, behaviour or what they actually contribute to society? Money is good. Obviously. But money doesn’t automatically make you intelligent. Money doesn’t make you educated. Money doesn’t make you a good role model. And money definitely doesn’t mean everything you say suddenly deserves to be listened to. Somehow, we have reached a point where knowledge seems almost irrelevant once someone has money and followers. And I think part of the problem is the kind of entertainment we have slowly normalised. There was a time when Cowbellpedia, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, Ultimate Search and Tales by Moonlight were things children actually watched. You could sit in front of the television and come out knowing something. Now compare that with what dominates social media. Big Brother Naija, relationship drama, influencer beef, public embarrassment, people fighting online, people crying over relationships and people doing increasingly ridiculous things because they know it will get them views. Before somebody starts shouting, “So you don’t like entertainment?” Please, that’s not what I’m saying. I enjoy entertainment too. Not everything needs to be educational. But there is a difference between enjoying stupid content for fun and building an entire culture where stupidity is rewarded. And there is also a difference between authenticity and ignorance. Because apparently, once somebody says, “This is just who I am,” we’re no longer allowed to question anything they do. You can be authentic and still be wrong. You can be authentic and still be ignorant. You can be authentic and still be a terrible role model. Being yourself doesn’t automatically make you admirable. Take Peller, for example. Whether you like him or not, you cannot deny that he has built a massive audience. And that is actually where my problem becomes bigger than Peller. Because why does this kind of content work? Why are millions of people willing to give this person their attention? Because we are the audience. We are the ones pressing like. We are the ones commenting. We are the ones reposting. We are the ones sending the videos to our friends. We are literally funding the relevance we complain about. And this applies to a lot of these internet personalities. Some have built their platforms around controversy. Some around relationships. Some around money. Some around shock value. Some literally just do whatever they know will get people talking. And I’m not saying they shouldn’t be famous. I’m saying being famous and being valuable are two different things. You can have millions of followers and still have nothing meaningful to teach anybody. You can be rich and still be intellectually empty. You can be famous and still be a terrible role model. Followers are not a certificate of intelligence. And this is where it gets even more annoying. There are people on TikTok actually trying to educate people. There is literally a STEM feed on TikTok for science, technology, engineering and mathematics. How many people even know that? How many Nigerian educational creators are getting millions of likes from teaching people something useful? There are people who make videos teaching pronunciation and etiquette. I remember seeing one lady explain how to pronounce a difficult word and instead of people saying, “Oh, I didn’t know that,” the comments were basically people laughing at her. Why? Why is learning so embarrassing to us? Why is it easier to mock someone who is trying to educate you than to actually learn something from them? You can open TikTok and see someone doing the most ridiculous thing you’ve ever seen and somehow they have millions of views. Then somebody makes a video about science, history, mathematics, technology, pronunciation or anything educational and suddenly everybody disappears. And maybe the problem isn’t even TikTok’s algorithm. Maybe the algorithm is simply showing us what we have already told it we want. Because algorithms follow attention. If we watch nonsense for three hours, comment under it, share it and send it to ten people, what exactly do we expect the algorithm to keep showing us? We complain about the content while constantly rewarding it. And that is the part nobody wants to admit. We say we want intelligent people to have influence, but our attention says otherwise. We say education is important, but educational creators are often the ones we ignore. We say we don’t like people behaving badly online, but the moment somebody does something outrageous, we all rush to watch. Someone embarrasses themselves? “Drop the video!” Someone is fighting? “Part 2 please!” Someone is crying? “What’s the story?” Someone says something completely ridiculous? “😭😭😭” Then after giving them 5 million views, we complain that they are everywhere. My brother, you put them there. And this is why I don’t think the problem is simply that “olodos” are going viral. The bigger problem is that we keep rewarding them. What we reward, people will produce more of. If knowledge gets attention, more people will create educational content. If creativity gets attention, more people will become creative. If talent gets attention, more people will develop their talent. But if controversy, shamelessness, ignorance and ridiculous behaviour get millions of views, followers and money… Why wouldn’t more people start doing it? At this point, being outrageous is almost a business model. And maybe that’s what this whole Olodo Uprising is really about. Not whether every person who makes silly content is actually stupid. Not whether every influencer should suddenly become an academic. And definitely not whether people are allowed to have fun. The question is: What exactly are we choosing to reward? Are we genuinely celebrating authenticity? Or have we created a society where ignorance is more entertaining than knowledge, where shamelessness is more profitable than substance and where being ridiculous gets you more attention than being intelligent? Because if someone can spend years learning, building a skill and trying to educate people and barely get noticed… While someone else can behave outrageously for five minutes and become a celebrity… Then maybe we need to stop asking why the olodos are winning. And start asking ourselves: Why are we the ones handing them the trophy? Olodo Uprising.

Other insights from Zarah Writes

Referral Earning

Points-to-Coupons