In South Korea, crisis means cash for Yoon’s far-right YouTube cheerleaders

The profits of South Korea’s far-right YouTubers supporting President Yoon Suk-yeol have nearly doubled since his botched martial law imposition on December 3.

Concerns are growing that the inflammatory rhetoric of extremist video bloggers could escalate into a security threat akin to terrorism, as their provocations played a key role in Sunday’s violent intrusion into the Seoul Western District Court.

Six of the top seven far-right YouTube channels saw their Superchat revenues surge by an average of 2.1 times in December compared to the previous month – coinciding with the December 3 martial law declaration – according to data submitted by the analytics platform Playboard to Representative Chung Il-young of the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea on Sunday

Superchat is a feature that allows viewers to financially support YouTubers through live chat during broadcasts, with donation amounts ranging from 500,000 won (US$343) to 10 million won per episode.

One channel, the largest among far-right YouTubers with 1.62 million subscribers, saw its Superchat earnings jump to 125 million won (US$85,700) in December, a 65.92 million won increase from the previous month.

Another channel with 340,000 subscribers saw a 2.5-fold increase in earnings, rising from 8.68 million won in November to 21.87 million won in December.