USC sues YouTube user for inciting ‘panic panic’ with classroom takeover prank

The University of Southern California is suing two YouTubers after they allegedly posed a “credible threat of imminent classroom violence” by interrupting a lecture to film a prank video.

The school has filed temporary injunctions against Ernest Kanevsky and Yuguo Bai, who are not USC students, after they staged three “classroom hijacking pranks” videos. The restraining order, issued by a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge on Friday, bars the couple from leaving the University Park campus.

In the most recent “joke” filmed at USC, Kanevsky and Bai interrupted a lecture on the Holocaust and declared themselves part of the Russian mafia. The confrontation they staged in the classroom provoked panic among the students.

The lawsuit USC filed alleges that Kanevsky “routinely harassed, bullied, and intimidated unsuspecting citizens” across Los Angeles by filming “prank” videos for his YouTube channel. He was often “dangerous and reckless” conducting “classroom takeovers” with the help of Bai, who shoots stunts and has his own YouTube channel, according to the lawsuit.

Kanevsky and Bai’s hiatus left students with “mental distress and genuine fear for their personal well-being”, the complaint states, and with “the national context of the concerns of video games”. active shooting” on colleges, the disruption has contributed to “growing anxiety” on campus. safety.

Kanevsky and Bai did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

In a statement for New York Times“The whole lawsuit and what people are reporting is very deceptive,” Kanevsky said.

He described the lawsuit as “reaching the maximum” in a Comment on Instagram in Monday.

Bans are issued in the context of change in public acceptance Online prank content was extremely popular on YouTube years ago. Audiences are becoming less and less tolerant of cruel and hateful prank videos, especially when filmed in public spaces like university campuses.

Cynthia Gendrich, a theater professor at Wake Forest University who teaches laughter and sociology, previously told NBC that there is a limit to the public’s tolerance for jokes.

“A lot of theorists point out at that time when our hearts [or] Empathy becomes the moment when we just can’t laugh,” she said.

In one incident on March 29, Kanevsky and Bai stormed into a USC class giving a Holocaust lecture in costume, according to the lawsuit. Kanevsky allegedly dressed as a “member of the Russian Mafia”, while Bai pretended to be Hugo Boss, a German designer Nazi-made military uniforms throughout World War II.

Kanevsky entered the class carrying a “special silver briefcase” and asked if Hugo Boss was in the room, the complaint states, noting that the professor believes a “potential violence” is imminent. out and Kanevsky targeted his class because of the topic of the lecture.

The pair then staged a confrontation and Kanevsky reached into his silver briefcase, causing a “wave of panic” among the students, according to the lawsuit. They began running away from the classroom in a “crazy attempt” to escape the incident. Some tripped and collided with each other, and others left behind laptops and backpacks.

“I was near the door and I started running outside,” said student Avery Kotler USC Annenberg Media. “Everybody just left in a really big panic.”

Officers eventually stopped the pair with guns in a parking structure on campus, the lawsuit states.

Kanevsky told the New York Times that the incident was “part of a dare that was supposed to be a harmless, humorous scene”.

“The whole idea that we’re targeting a Holocaust class is absurd,” he added. “Hugo Boss is exactly the name Yuguo uses.”

The incident was just the latest in a string of disruptive classroom takeovers orchestrated by Kanevsky and Bai.

In September, Kanevsky, Bai, and a third individual burst into a classroom and physically threatened the professor to leave, before all took turns “lecturing” the students, the lawsuit states. The professor, who was “apparently shaken up”, asked campus security to accompany him during lectures for “several weeks” after the incident.

During an incident in November, Kanevsky, Bai and two others interrupted a presentation while dressing up as characters from the violent show “Squid Game,” according to the lawsuit. Bai, dressed as a “player”, enters the classroom being chased by Kanevsky, who is dressed as a “guard”. They staged an apparent kidnapping with Bai shouting, “If they catch me, my family will die!”

The complaint says some students appeared “shaking” after the incident.

Kanevsky and Bai have performed similar stunts at other universities, together and separately. Last year, Kanevsky and another individual bragged about evacuating a classroom at the University of California, Los Angeles campus during a YouTube Videos. What appears to be campus security removed Bai from Santiago Canyon College after he interrupted students during a test to give a “motivational speech” during a video posted earlier this month. In one YouTube Videos Posted last year, the University of Texas, Dallas police department appears to have issued a crime alert to Kanevsky after he interrupted a lecture.

UCLA, Santiago Canyon College and UT Dallas did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Kanevsky and Bai did not respond to requests for comment on previous incidents at other facilities.

USC’s lawsuit against Kanevsky and Bai also seeks financial damages for damages, and prohibits the pair from publishing much university-related content.

“The court’s order to issue a temporary restraining order underscores the need to provide a sense of stability and comfort in an in-person learning environment and in the context of campus safety concerns across the globe.” nationwide,” USC said in a statement Monday. “The court’s ruling should be seen as a warning that such conduct will not be tolerated by these or any other individuals.”

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