In the past few years when short ** live broadcasts have been popular, all kinds of anchors have emerged in an endless stream, and the edge anchors may be the most shameful to mention.
Rubbing anchors, as the name suggests, means that anchors use the rules of the platform to make some "vulgar edge balls" behaviors, so as to win the attention of fans and increase the traffic and rewards in the live broadcast room.
25-year-old Xiao Luo is also one of the anchors who rub the edge. Xiao Luo is a native of Nanning, Guangxi, a designer by profession, and currently works in a children's training institution in Shenzhen.
Since 2019, Xiao Luo has been a side-rubbing anchor on a male-dominated dating platform in the form of male pretence. Xiao Luo said that the reason for stepping into this industry was out of kindness, but the impact and shock brought to him by the live broadcast greatly exceeded his imagination.
What does a man experience when he becomes the carrier of the "male gaze"?
The following is what Xiao Luo said.
Reasons to become a streamer
Everyone may not believe it when I say it, but I am a side-wiping anchor to rescue stray cats and dogs.
I have a deep affection for dogs and cats. My fate with them has almost run through the whole process of my growth.
When I was a child, my family lived in the countryside and had a small earth dog named Xiao Huang. Xiao Huang is very heartfelt to protect the Lord, and it follows me when I go. Once I was playing by the river and fell into the water, it was Xiao Huang who bit my clothes and dragged me back to the shore. Since then, Xiao Huang's status in my family is no different from that of my family.
Yellow lived for 15 years, and at the end of its life, it became old and weak. We had already figured out how to let him live in peace, but the unscrupulous dog dealer took him and sold it to the county dog meat shop. By the time we arrived at the dog meat shop, Xiao Huang's body had been dismembered.
Xiao Huang's death hit me very hard. I don't have a dog anymore because in my heart, there is no dog that can replace Yellow.
When I was in college, my roommate chased the girl and did what she liked, and raised a little milk cat in the dormitory. I took the initiative to take over the responsibility of taking care of the kitten, raising it to be white and fat, and the relationship between the kitten and I was also very good. Later, the roommate failed to chase the girl, became disheartened, and transferred the kitten to someone else. When I saw the kitten again, it was lying on the inside of the green belt outside the school, and it looked like it had been cruelly abused and abandoned.
What happened to the cats and dogs has always haunted me, and I especially want to save the fate of stray cats and dogs, so much so that I always carry pet snacks in my pocket to feed them when I meet them.
My fate with my girlfriend An An is also drawn by cats and dogs. We went to a school, she also likes small animals, she can't walk when she sees cats and dogs, and when she feeds cats and dogs, we meet, know each other, and love each other.
After falling in love, An An was very supportive of my idea of rescuing cats and dogs. Unlike my hesitation, she was a very decisive person, and immediately decided to take the stray cat we fed together as the first person to be rescued.
The kitten is a white cat. In the wild, the white cat is particularly vulnerable to being bullied by its peers, and every time we see it, it is scarred.
Since we were still living in the school at the time, our roommates on both sides were reluctant to keep animals in the dormitory, so we had to build a kitten nest for him in the school grove so that he would not have nowhere to go.
I thought we were doing a good job, but it wasn't long before I found out that the cat nest had been trampled flat and the cat was nowhere to be found. I have come to understand that it is not enough to provide food and shelters, and the most basic conditions for rescuing stray cats and dogs are not only food and water, but also health check-ups, medical protection and a stable and safe shelter.
That's a lot of money. But An An and I made up our minds that if we don't have money, let's make money.
The live broadcast is the first to test the waters
In our juniors, the first way we thought of making money was to work part-time - working as a waiter in a café for 10 yuan an hour.
Outside of class, we all worked in a café, and after a month, we were physically and mentally exhausted, so we saved 1,800 yuan, which was spent on a stray dog.
We calculated that the basic cost of rescuing a stray cat is about 1,000 yuan, and the dog is even higher. The money for a part-time job is a drop in the bucket.
The girlfriend thought of the live stream. Live broadcast is on the cusp in 2019, we think very simply, how caring it is to rescue stray cats and dogs, there will definitely be many people to reward us.
In the beginning, we tried to live stream on big platforms like Douyin. Because of my social phobia, I didn't dare to show my face, so An An and I held a dog in front of the camera to show it, plus a small blackboard with the words "College students rescue stray cats and dogs". As a result, it was broadcast for half a month, and the audience in the live broadcast room did not exceed 20 people.
We are very frustrated, and we swipe the live broadcast rooms of other anchors every day, and find that people like us who have no talent will be more suitable to be entertainment anchors or chat anchors.
After some psychological struggle, An An and I decided to show our faces. But our looks are very ordinary, and we don't know anything about lighting and live broadcasting, and there are fewer people in the live broadcast room.
Later, An An swiped a blogger who taught operation and paid 300 yuan to enter the consulting group. The other party mercilessly pointed out that ordinary people do live broadcasts, if they can't get out, there is no need for live broadcasts. People who watch live broadcasts on the Internet either have shopping needs or want to have fun, and put a blackboard there saying that they want to rescue cats and dogs, which is no different from beggars kneeling under the bridge and saying, "I only need 5 yuan to eat".
What's even more heartbreaking for us is that the other party also said that our appearance has no advantage as a chat anchor, especially on a big platform where talents are gathered, equipment, talent, and eloquence are not as good as others.
But there is no way out to be a serious chat anchor on dating software. Bloggers told us that on this kind of software, men's money is the best to make, and there will be traffic if they will rub the edges. She asked An An to open a beauty filter to be a side-wiping anchor, and no one would recognize her in real life.
However, letting my girlfriend be the anchor of the side, An An and I are particularly repulsed.
Just when we were about to give up, the two dogs confirmed our thoughts.
After graduating, An An and I worked in Shenzhen, and at first the actual salary was very low, only 4 Xi,000 yuan a month, barely making ends meet.
One day, An An went to feed stray cats and dogs near the large garbage station in the urban village as usual, and there were many stray cats and dogs in the remote area to forage for food or build nests. An An found that a man was burning the cat's hair with a lighter, and she angrily stepped forward to stop it, but the man was angered. The two got into a verbal altercation, and the man pushed her to the ground and viciously abused her. There were people watching from afar, but no one reached out to help.
When the rescued milk cat was feeling isolated and helpless, two stray dogs that she often fed ran over, barked at the man, and finally drove the man away.
An An was particularly moved and brought the dogs home, and the two of us were determined to make money to rescue stray cats and dogs that night.
However, on the first day of An An's live broadcast wearing jk**, he received a huge psychological impact. **Although the number of people is not large, those foul words have been swiping the screen. Seeing my girlfriend being wronged, as a boyfriend, I don't feel very good in my heart.
I broke the jar and said, why don't I be the anchor of the edge?I'm a man, and I'm not afraid of being scolded by those people. An An burst into tears and laughed, saying that she would put on makeup for me and test the water.
An An and I are about the same height and weight, 173cm, only 115 pounds. An An is a lover of Japanese dramas, there are a lot of JK skirts and wigs at home, she usually loves beauty, likes to learn makeup from bloggers, and often uses me to practice. In order to save money, we didn't choose to buy any more equipment, I put on An An's long brown curly hair, put on a leg-length JK skirt and black **, she put foundation and lipstick on me, and then turned on the beauty filter, not to mention, it's pretty good.
An An's skirt finished eating after work the next day, and I started the live broadcast. The first time I wore ** live broadcast, I felt very novel and nervous, I didn't dare to look at the camera at first, and I didn't know what to do, so I stayed in front of the camera and didn't speak.
An An looked at it and felt that it was not good, there were quite a lot of viewers coming in and out, but they couldn't keep it. Thinking that I couldn't sing or dance, she suggested that I do radio gymnastics. In order to reassure me, she danced with me in places where the camera couldn't be shot, and from time to time she made a face at me to make me happy. Seeing her quirky appearance, I was amused and gradually let go of it. I thought that no one would come in to watch, but in less than half an hour, the audience in the live broadcast room was as high as more than 100 people.
At the beginning, the barrage was saying, what is this woman doing?After a while, foul language filled the screen again. Some people asked me to spread my legs a little more, someone asked me to pout my butt a little higher, and there was a steady stream of explicit meat words and memes in private messages.
Someone also asked me to call "brother", and I did so, and the barrage instantly became even crazier. They said, "This is a man?"What are men doing here?Homosexual?Want to make a duck?It's disgusting!”
Every time I see someone scolding me, I go back, resulting in a two-and-a-half-hour live broadcast, with a lot of people watching, but very few rewards.
An An and I went to ask the blogger what to do, should I use a voice changer?The other party said that the majority of our live broadcast platforms are male users, and they will only reward if the person is likable. More than 100 people watched it as soon as it started, which shows that my traffic and popularity are good, and I have great potential. In the end, she warned me that if you want to make money, you should not have a temper.
When a male receives the "male gaze".
It took me a long time to get used to going live. Every time I have to cater to the meat words of the male audience, I feel very uncomfortable in the live broadcast room to call the big brother to brush gifts.
I usually broadcast live for two hours after half past eight every night, most of the time I dance the Douyin hot dance that the audience likes, those dances are only a few tens of seconds, not very difficult, I usually use my lunch break to practice Xi on the top floor of the company during work, and I can dance a few times.
When dancing live, I don't have to say too much, the audience will directly hit the screen if they want to ask, I pick a few answers, say some flattering sweet words, and someone will give gifts.
An An will remember the ID with the most gifts in each game, and every time that ID appears, she will remind me to say hello to the other party to retain fans.
There are still some times when I wear ** Xiao Luo, I will participate in the microphone PK, interact with other anchors, perform talents when I am paired with a talent anchor, and play simple games such as truth or dare or idiom solitaire.
Every time I PK with others, An An will canvass for votes next to me with her voice, "Brothers, light a fire, crowdfund small gifts, and beat her!.""I couldn't help but laugh several times.
Even Mai Dozen PK can increase popularity, and the platform will recommend traffic, but some uncontrollable things will happen. The most excessive time was when I lost the task, and I was asked by the other anchor to eat cucumbers eroticly in front of the camera, and the other party would tell me what to do and what kind of sound to make.
I felt very ashamed, but I did it anyway because the audience loved it and the gifts were very enthusiastic. It was the first time I cried in a live stream, and I thanked the tip painfully while shedding tears. As a result, the barrage became more exciting, and unsightly comments filled the entire screen.
I still can't forget that humiliation. Although I earned 2,000 yuan from the live broadcast that night, I have never played PK with anyone since then.
The impact of live streaming has also affected my daily life.
When the boys are together, they all like to joke and tell some meat jokes, and in the past, I didn't think it was a big deal, and sometimes I would echo it, but now I have a physiological disgust.
When you go to the street with your buddies and see a girl with a good figure, everyone is Xi to make a look and signal each other to look at the girl's chest or legs. That kind of three-point obscene and seven-point laughing look makes me uncomfortable, and it always reminds me of the ridicule of my appearance and figure in the live broadcast room.
The new female leader of the company is the same age as us, and the male colleagues gossip in the small group, speculating whether there is someone behind her, or whether she has an ambiguous relationship with the boss, and I suddenly returned to that moment - I explained in every possible way in the live broadcast room that "I am not a periphery" and "I am not gay", but others swiped the screen with the formation: "It seems that you are!".Otherwise, what are you breaking the defense?”
If I hadn't experienced it myself, I'm afraid I would never have understood what a girl's "male gaze" meant, and how much harm it can do to women.
For fear of being recognized, I never took off my mask when I was out of the house, and I was nervous every day in the company.
One day during the live broadcast, I saw a barrage and said, "The anchor is only 800 meters away from me, and I seem to have guessed who you are hehe." ”
Because I could see the general positioning of the live broadcast, I was frightened at the time, and I hurriedly went off the air, and I didn't sleep all night. The next day I went to work, and my colleague came running from behind and patted me on the shoulder, and I was so frightened that I sat on the ground, and my colleague was also surprised by my reaction, and told others behind my back that I had a nervous disorder.
Before, I couldn't stay at home at all, and I loved to go out and play. But now I'm so reluctant to go out, even if it's to buy groceries at the supermarket downstairs, it makes me scared, and I walk down the street and feel like everyone is laughing at me malice.
Even the animals we have adopted, I am a little afraid to come close. Once I hugged my cats and dogs in front of the camera and confessed why I was doing a different live broadcast, but no one cared what I was talking about. The comment area is all brushing "Or the anchor can play", "People can't satisfy you anymore".
No matter what I do, people in the live broadcast room can associate it in the direction of sex. It made me feel very sick and powerless.
But on the other hand, I don't want to give up on live streaming easily. The money I earn from live streaming can really save the lives of cats and dogs, and the sense of accomplishment is incomparable to seeing a dying little life being rescued from your hands.
Let stray cats and dogs have a home
The cats and dogs that An An and I rescued were all pet cats and dogs that looked seriously ill at a glance or had poor survival ability in the wild. Those cats and dogs that have grown up in the wild and have been wandering, we will not go to the rescue, because they have their own way of survival, and it is not good for us to forcibly bring them back.
After the cats and dogs are good, we will post information on the platform to see if there are any well-wishers willing to adopt them and find a home for them.
At the beginning, we didn't control the number of rescues, and when we saw cats and dogs with insect disease or injuries, we picked them up**. My live broadcast income is about 5,000 yuan a month on average, which is not low, but because of the excessive expenses, in the first few months, An An and I overdrew our salaries and even our savings, and it was not enough to spend, so we had to ask my parents for money.
At first, we kept the rescued cats and dogs in our rented house and lived with us. But because most of them were injured and sick, the smell was very strong, and we were complained about by our neighbors, and our own resting environment was also very poor. Later, we rented a small warehouse for 500 yuan a month as a temporary storage place for cats and dogs.
Since then, we have controlled the number of dogs and cats we pick up. 6 stray cats and dogs are the limit of what we can afford.
The dog in the first aid was depressed for a long time because of the live broadcast, and when I was in the worst state, An An also advised me, or don't do it?But looking at the cats and dogs at home, it was difficult for me to make this decision.
One time I was so uncomfortable that I cried, and one of the golden retrievers we picked up kept looking at me at my feet, with wrinkled eyes and seemed to be sad with me. When it saw me looking at it, it immediately grinned, stuck out its tongue, wagged its tail, and amused me again.
The Golden Retriever is a natural comfort dog that is sensitive to the emotions of its owner. He knew that I was uncomfortable, so he would always be there for me, and if a cat pounced on me, he would also chase the cat away, leaving me a quiet space.
We and the cats and dogs ** each other, and in the end, they are like our adopted children, unable to part.
After a while, I found myself becoming immune to those rogue comments. I began to learn to do live broadcast as a job, not mixed with too many personal feelings, learn Xi new Internet hot songs and dances every once in a while, and also use the trumpet to go to the same type of popular live broadcast room to watch other people's chat skills, and study how to talk to the audience's heart.
Although, how enthusiastic I was during the live broadcast, how embarrassed I was after the end, especially when facing my girlfriend, I always felt very shameless. But An An didn't mind, and praised me for doing a good job, saying that we were doing something meaningful.
Usually Xiao Luo and An An like to cook together, but after 2022, the live broadcast of big platforms has risen rapidly, and the dating platform where we are located has begun to decline. My live broadcast room has dropped from an average of 300 people to about 100 people, and my income has been halved.
At the same time, the pet market ushered in the outlet, especially in a metropolis like Shenzhen, where there are more and more pet stores and pet hospitals, and people have begun to pay attention to the protection of stray animals, and we rarely pick up injured cats and dogs.
In addition to being relieved, An An and I were also a little disappointed. In the past three years, we have become Xi to being a rescuer of cats and dogs, and we are also Xi to their company, and suddenly found that someone is doing better than us, we are no longer needed, and we are inevitably a little lost.
But we were soon relieved, and the small animals were treated well, isn't that our original intention?
Doing a live broadcast to rescue cats and dogs is a special experience and a small episode in my life, but it will never be a long-term solution. An An and I both hope that after saving enough money from work, we will start a different pet store and name it "Stray Home", hoping that stray cats and dogs can come to "Stray Home" to find their warmth.