The Story Behind Scumbag Steve

Blake Boston, who most of us know as Scumbag Steve of Millis, MA, loving father, is a cook by profession, and a musician. WBUR recently brought him on to ask about his meme experience, and he shared his eye-opening story with them. A little while ago, Blake was playing shows with his high school band, and his mother, Susan, was getting into photography. His mother wanted to support him and thought if she made him promo photos for his shows, it would increase his popularity. So one day, she took a picture of him in the doorway when he wasn’t even ready for it and then uploaded it to MySpace. His photo went viral on the internet, and he became an “ADVICE ANIMAL” meme.

Unfortunately, he and his mother found themselves the target of hate by anonymous people on the internet that fully believed he was a scumbag. Many people projected the bad things they encountered in their lives onto Blake and got very personal with their hate towards him. This harassment then translated into trauma for Blake and his mother. While these memes with Blake portrayed terrible behavior, especially towards women, Blake was the complete opposite of what many of the memes showed with Scumbag Steve. And at the time he went viral, he was also fighting a painful custody battle that emotionally wound him. Many of us have shared memes before and haven’t cared to look into the real story behind them. I suggest you listen to the podcast to hear the whole story of “Scumbag Steve.”

https://www.wbur.org/radioboston/2021/11/18/scumbag-steve-memes-endless-thread