Ben Stiller is one of those comedic actors from your childhood that you think are hilarious as a kid, only to reach adulthood and realize he never was, you were just eight.
In 2003, a 14 year old in Trois-Rivières, Quebec, Canada filmed himself swinging a golf ball retriever like a lightsaber in his high school studio. It was never meant for anyone to see. Classmates found the tape, uploaded it, and a blogger named Andy Baio reposted it on his website and gave it the name that stuck: Star Wars Kid. It became arguably the first major viral video on the internet, viewed hundreds of millions of times and parodied on shows like South Park, Arrested Development, and The Colbert Report.
Ghyslain Raza was not in on the joke. People online told him to end his life. Local media tracked him at school and tried to photograph him through his family’s window blinds. He left school, was privately tutored, and needed psychiatric care. His family sued his classmates and settled out of court. He then went almost completely silent for nearly 20 years. He was never even a Star Wars fan.
In that silence, he earned degrees in civil and common law from McGill University and began pursuing a doctorate at Queen’s University. In 2022, he agreed to a documentary, his first time speaking publicly. As part of the filming, Andy Baio, who had gone on to become CTO of Kickstarter, sat down with Raza face to face in Portland. He told him “I have enormous regret about posting the video.” The classmates who originally uploaded it have never apologised. Raza accepted Baio’s apology, calling him an empathetic person who simply made a bad judgement call. When the cameras stopped, the two of them talked about old computers and typography.
@CarltonErnest Annnd, you didn't read the post. I haven't sold and neither have any founders. I cant control what everyone in the world does after they buy it.