~Instagram Honorable Mention~
Fully Vaccinated People Can…
Instagram is where I go to see people who consider themselves online and plugged in repost weeks old memes from twitter. It hurts my heart to see people think they’re being irreverent and original post the same meme as other people who consider themselves irreverent and original. Politics and a Nicki Minaj lyric? Whoever heard of such a thing? Glad yous are all having fun.
Now, On to Real Business…
Twitter
RIP Open for a Surprise
We lost a great part of the internet this week. The Twitter crop algorithm was fixed so we can now see the whole image instead of twitter zooming in on the worst part of whatever picture you’re posting. The algorithm was poorly designed and most egregiously favored white faces over people of color, no idea if this part itself was fixed but I assume they must be working on it, right? This fix is good for internet usage over all. However with this fix we lose the fun game of “Open for a surprise”, people manipulating the algorithm and their photo so that when you opened the full picture you could see something abnormal that was previously hidden. It was making the best of a bad situation and we had fun opening those images to see they had been edited to make someone very tall, or that there was a hidden person you would never expect in the photo. It was fun, we had fun, and now that the fun’s over, we have a better easier to use website (in theory). But we’ll miss open for a surprise. It was one of the great misuses of a poorly designed function we had. Like the Brian Eno quote about how we miss what made a format unique as soon as it’s been fixed and removed in the new format, On the internet we exploit what makes a feature bad for our enjoyment until the grown ups in charge wise up and fix it.
Cheugy
We can’t keep having casual conversations about bad taste when our collective consciousness is incapable of saying they don’t like something because they think it’s ugly. Obviously taste is informed by socio-economic factors like class, race, and location but some things are just ugly. We can consider the contributing factors forever but if we never consider the indescribable x factor that is what makes something cool, we will never get to the bottom of it. There is currently a girl on tiktok who is saying that it’s a way for white women to bully other white women. Ok? Let us do that. We all can’t like each other and Rae Dunn merch is ugly, so I’m going say that. The other problem with cheugy is that everyone who isn’t an avid tiktok user or in this network of girls who know this one girl from LA, hadn’t heard of it. When new slang comes around everyone loses their mind. You guys can’t freak out every time someone with an ounce of charisma says something that’s easy to repeat. You’re not behind the times, you’re just probably have a job and can’t follow fake internet things. That’s my job and why you read my newsletter.
Tiktok
Have You Seen The State of Her Body
It grew on me. Americans really love British rap because it is goofy. Not understanding British people is one of the great American past times. Americans know we sound silly and we jump on the chance to point out that the Brits do too. The British won’t admit it AND they have a monarchy, which makes them double silly. After hearing this sound 10,000 times I have an appreciation for it and sing it to myself. “Is it me or the lifestyle sweetheart? Actually I don’t give a shit.” Plays in my head throughout the day.
College Reveals (Original Format)
Ok truly I love this. I love when people see people doing something that is a little lame but also a little fun and decide to do it too. Are these girls making fun of the original girls? Yes. Did they take the time to make skirts with their college on them and make a nearly identical video? Also yes. The girls in the original video are having fun and so are all the girls making fun of them by doing the exact same thing they’re doing. It’s light teasing mixed with genuine effort so it all evens out to being morally neutral.
It’s Goes to the Economy
I was wrong last week when I said Joe Biden was going to be super memeable for no reason. I forgot that every time he opens his mouth he says the craziest thing in the world. So I’m amending my Joe Biden meme statement. Joe Biden will create good memes when we don’t try to change him or manufacture one. When we are just repeating what he says, we will be funny because he is funny, intentional or not. People will do their usual I love to buy stupid things with this and that’s fine because I love to see the stupid things people buy.
Also the caption says “it goes to the economy” but is he not saying it grows the economy? Which is a thing people say and are concerned about? We want to grow the economy, right?
I’ll Never Forget You
I think some of you are lying about having babies with these random men. People on Tiktok love to lie about having babies and I don’t understand why. Admitting to being a mother on the internet will only get you scorn and judgement. Personally I’m putting off being a mother for as long as possible for that very reason.
Let Me Out Let Me Out
It’s either trauma dumping or people wondering why we don’t analyze pop music before we dance to it. The second one could lead to interesting conversations about art vs business, art vs artist, death of the author, but it’s Tiktok so it won’t.
The Woman Redoing Her Bathroom
This one is not a meme but it is the account of the month where every update is crazier than the last. If you want to lose an hour of your life scroll to about a week ago on her account and see what she has done with this bathroom. Someone needs to help her, even just workload wise. Every day I think she has made progress and then she’ll post an update and she’s made it worse or has to start something over. I hate home renovations and the idea of living somewhere without a bathroom for upwards of a week because someone wants to make it “better” is truly upsetting to me. I wish her the best but she is stressing me out.
Sorry there was no Sunday edition. No one said anything so No Harm, No Foul.
Hated open for a surprise, excited it’s gone, but still happy to see a respectful post-mortem on its impact.
I have convinced myself that the Woman Redoing Her Bathroom is an ongoing video art piece, and for me, that makes it a less stressful watch