Does a video captioned "Free headphones hack" shared on social media authentically show a Black man stealing a train passenger's headphones? No, that's not true: The video was first posted by a social media creator who shares similar ones of him stealing people's items from trains and dancing afterward as part of an ongoing sketch series. It was reshared to X by another account without this context.
The claim appeared in a video (archived here) on X on February 18, 2025, with the caption:
I wonder why stereotypes exist.
This is how the video appeared on X at the time of writing:
(Source: X screenshot taken Wed Feb 18 10:06:53 2025 UTC)
The video above is missing important context. It was originally posted (archived here) to YouTube shorts by a social media creator, @dre_da_dancer, on January 22, 2025, with a caption that read:
Free headphones hack 🎧 #shorts Tutorial out now click the link 🕺🏽 
This is a bit. @dre_da_dancer posts similar videos of him grabbing items in a "free speaker hack" (archived here), "free bag hack," "free girl hack" and "free phone hack" social media video series. These clips are shared across his social media channels: TikTok, Instagram and YouTube. In each post, the man does the same dance at the end of the "hack" to suggest that this is a recurring comedy bit.
In particular, he describes himself as a "Dancer" on his Instagram profile. He also provides an email for bookings with a note specifying "Promos Not refundable!!!!" as shown in the screenshot below:
(Source: Instagram screenshot taken Wed Feb 19 15:52:16 2025 UTC)
Together, these suggest that @dre_da_dancer is an entertainer, and these videos were created for entertainment purposes.
Lead Stories contacted @dre_da_dancer for comment on the video and will update this article if a response is received.
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Other Lead Stories fact checks involving the entertainment industry can be read here.
