Shabaz Ali is a 30-year-old chemistry teacher from Blackburn. He adores his job. After only five minutes in his company, you get a sense of how he might be in front of a classroom – funny, playful, engaged. But after he’s turned off the Bunsen burners, Ali goes home and steps into his other “office”: his bed. Here, with the hood of his onesie pulled up, he clocks in for his other vocation as a social media personality. His TikTok channel, Shabaz Says, has an audience of millions.
Ali is known for his scathing reaction videos to pretentious displays of wealth and bizarre social media trends. They proliferate fast in this world. When influencers post about going to “gourmet water bars”, making “designer ice”, or step-by-step guides to “fridge curation” (organising your fridge to be as minimalistic as possible), Ali has something withering to say.
