Smack Cam

About

Smack Cam is a Vine video fad featuring short clips of people hitting unsuspecting victims in the head with an open palm or various objects.

Origin

On June 27th, 2013, Vine user Max Jerry tweeted a video clip titled “Smack Cam,” in which he slaps a man laying on a couch in the face. Within the first month, the Vine^[1] received over 175 retweets.

Smack Cam Dimitry Bajeux #SmackCam#SorryNotSorry#slaphttps://t.co/Bz3vtVyn7b

— MAX JR (@Max_DGAF) June 27, 2013

Precursor

A running gag in the 2010 comedy film Jackass 3D featured cast and crew members being surprised with a hit in the face with a boxing glove by actor Bam Margera (shown below).

Spread

On July 10th, Max Jerry uploaded a compilation of his Smack Cam Vine videos to YouTube, gaining more than 291,000 views and 580 comments in the next three weeks.

On July 26th, the women’s interest blog Jezebel^[2] published an article criticizing the fad, which linked to several Smack Cam Vines featuring women being violently hit in the face, many of which have since been deleted. The same day, the pop culture blog Complex^[3] published an article about the videos, which quoted Smack Cam creator Max Jerry’s opinion on how the fad had become increasingly violent.

“I’m really scared how far people are going with Smack Cams now. When boys are smacking girls, hitting animals or even kids, it’s a bit out of hand, especially with hard objects. I started Smack Cam for fun, not to see people come out with serious injuries.”

Also on July 26th, The Atlantic Wire^[5] and the Daily Mail^[4] reported on the controversy surrounding the videos. On July 28th, The Huffington Post^[6] published an article about the video, which highlighted several Vine video examples.

Notable Examples

Search Interest

External References