“I’ve seen Jeremy Fragrance’s face through posts more than the sight of my own mother and I live at home.” This comment on one of the fragrance icons’s videos made me begin pondering the endless possibilities of a piece exploring this absolute enigma of a man, his impact on the internet, and his tenuous grasp on reality. I first discovered his page whilst mindlessly doom-scrolling on Instagram and immediately went down a rabbit hole into the strange and fascinating world of Jeremy Fragrance. Regardless of what you think of him, with millions of followers across social media platforms, he is undeniably one of the foremost names in the fragrance industry.  

What makes Jeremy “Number 1” as he so often tells us? Is it the one-armed push up he regularly performs to demonstrate his immense strength, is it his unrivalled dance moves, or is it his unorthodox method of spraying perfume in his mouth as part of his reviewing process. Or is it a combination of all three plus much more? Either way his 23 daily videos – at least the ones he doesn’t delete – have become a source of endless entertainment for so many. When a Jeremy Fragrance video pops up on my feed I am immediately filled with a sense of abject anticipation and morbid curiosity as to what bizarre, unexpected direction he is going to take.

Jeremy posted his first video to YouTube 10 years ago and quickly built up a dedicated following with his engaging and unconventional style of fragrance reviews. He was always a somewhat eccentric character but I doubt that back then anyone would have been able to predict the downward spiral that was to come. Over the past few years, Jeremy has shared sexist and narcissistic views, and made videos where he performs bizarre dances while appearing to be under the influence of cocaine.

Recently Jeremy announced his “girlfriend search”, looking for a Christian woman under the age of 32. This got me reminiscing back to Chris Chan‘s infamous “Love Quest” back in the 2000s. Chris Chan, full name Christian Weston Chandler, was a severely autistic man (She has since transitioned but at the time identified as male) raised in an overly sheltered home environment which left them unprepared for the harsh realities of the outside world. In 2003 aged 21, and Spurred on by a lack of romantic experiences Chris set out on a journey to find a girlfriend by any means possible. His approach largely consisted of approaching women he had never met or barely spoken to and bluntly asking them to be his girlfriend.

This tactless approach led to Chris being expelled from his college for harassing female classmates, although he vehemently denied this and claimed he was being discriminated against due to his autism. Refusing to be deterred he took his Love Quest online to MySpace where his rise to infamy truly began. After gaining a modicum of internet fame Chris then took his antics to YouTube where things would begin to spiral even further out of control. He became subject to the torment of online trolls who would convince Chris to perform degrading acts on camera, often under the guise of being women who would be his girlfriend if he did as they commanded.

Now you might be a little confused as to how this all comes back to Jeremy Fragrance but in spite of their differences, they similarly fell victim to the ego trap of internet fame/infamy. A taste of online attention can quickly lead to someone who is desperate to be loved and known descending into increasingly depraved behaviour in search of that feeling. Whilst Jeremy may not have done anything quite as egregious as Chris Chan yet there is a worrying feeling that Jeremy’s seemingly increasing drug use combined with his craving for attention could lead down a similarly dark path.

I’d like to think that deep down Jeremy is a man of good intentions who just wants to make entertaining content for his fans and that his unhinged and problematic behaviour is largely the result of an out-of-control drug habit. In an ideal world, Jeremy would be able to get the help he needs and continue to receive engagement on his content even without the crazy antics, and maybe even be able to spread the word of Jesus that he so frequently preaches without being disingenuous. Whilst we can’t actually get into the mind of Jeremy Fragrance to determine his true intentions, we can say that he would probably be in a better position without the internet.

Whilst this is quite a bleak thought I do hope that you take away from the article an intention to be conscious with your use of social media and the internet as a whole. So next time you’re scrolling through Instagram reels or TikTok and you come across some odd content from a creator that doesn’t seem the most stable, its worth thinking twice before ironically liking the video or poking fun at them in the comment section, consider that you might be contributing to a fellow humans distress. The internet can be a dark and scary place so why not do our bit to make it safer and more positive for all of our benefit.