They say the average overnight success takes five years. For me it took closer to fifteen.
If you see the YouTube channel today with 1.3 million subscribers and clips from Trump rallies and debates on the streets it might look like it came out of nowhere. But that channel was made when I was nine years old.
Back then it was not politics. It was Minecraft and Call of Duty. After school I would grab my mom’s camcorder or my laptop and record myself building pixelated castles or chasing killstreaks. I didn’t know it at the time but every awkward voiceover and choppy jump cut was training. I fell in love with editing and spent hours learning how to cut stitch and polish video until it felt seamless. Hundreds of those videos are still sitting in private on my channel never meant for anyone else to see.
By high school I stopped uploading. Partly because I didn’t want to be the kid making Minecraft videos anymore and mostly because I was trying to get girls. Minecraft was not helping. But even then politics was creeping in. In fifth grade I got kicked out of class for debating my teacher on gay marriage while the Supreme Court was weighing in. I was probably being disruptive but I cared.
After high school I went to college in Northwest Indiana. It was supposed to be my next chapter but it felt off. Then I took a film class and started editing again. The muscle memory came back instantly. I remember thinking wait a minute I am still good at this. I forgot how much I loved it.
Around the same time Trump was holding a rally nearby. I had been mulling over an idea for months. What if I went to one of these rallies talked to people and edited it into a video. Nothing fancy. No screaming matches. Just simple pointed questions and honest answers.
I emailed every cameraman I could find. One agreed last minute. We went to the rally and that video changed my life.
It went viral not because I was trying to own anybody but because I didn’t. Baby faced me asked questions like what percent of the American population is transgender. One guy said I don’t know twenty percent. I told him it is actually zero point five percent. He was surprised but not hostile.
Then I asked another man what he thought about the idea of eradicating transgenderism. He replied no that is too far. Let people live how they want I just think we should keep it away from my kids. It wasn’t perfect but it was human. It showed nuance that does not fit into cable news segments or Twitter fights.
That moment defined my style. I didn’t want to humiliate people. I wanted to understand them and challenge them without condescension. There was an audience for that.
When I left college and built Mockler Media I wasn’t just chasing virality. I wanted to inject context empathy and accountability back into the conversation. As much as our politics feel divided the edges are not always as sharp as we think. When you talk to someone face to face it is harder to turn them into a caricature.
Looking back it all makes sense. The kid editing Minecraft clips was unknowingly preparing to cut political documentaries. The college dropout with a film class rediscovered his craft at the exact moment his country needed new voices.
Now millions of people are watching. I am still that same kid endlessly asking questions and trying to figure out how we fix this broken country.
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