Tubgirl

About

Tubgirl is a shock site image depicting a naked woman lying in a bathtub with her legs placed behind her head while a fountain of orange liquid gushes from her anus and falls back onto her face.

Origin

On December 12th, 2000, Rotten.com featured the image in a post titled "Feco Japanese I Really Think So.".^[1]

Spread

According to the shock image database Shock Chan,^[3] the image appeared on the entertainment/news blog Stile Project in 2001. On February 15th, 2002, the domain TubGirl.com was registered.^[2] On August 1st, 2005, Urban Dictionary^[4] user Mike Oxlong submitted an entry for "tubgirl," which describes the photo in detail. On October 18th, 2007, the tubgirl image was featured on the frontpage of the gaming news site Kotaku as part of a prank orchestrated by Gizmodo editor Brian Lam.^[6] That day, Kotaku^[7] posted an apology to readers who had seen the explicit image. On November 30th, YouTuber bambammargerashane uploaded a reaction video featuring two young boys viewing tubgirl and other shock sites (shown below, left). On December 11th, YouTuber Kat^[8] uploaded footage of herself mimicking the tubgirl pose on the floor of a dressing room. Within nine years, the video gained over 1.7 million views. On December 18th, YouTuber AutomaticTLC uploaded a short reaction clip in which a young woman views the tubgirl image and says "is that poop? It's like water" (shown below, right).

On January 4th, 2008, Gawker^[9] published an article by writer Nick Douglas providing a descriptions of tubgirl and other shock site media. On June 30th, 2009, YouTuber MultiCoolTV22 uploaded a reaction video in which two young women view the original tubgirl video (shown below, left). On July 21st, YouTuber Mama Dorkiness Everyday uploaded another reaction video of two women viewing the video (shown below, right).

On April 16th, 2011, YouTuber Billy Nunez uploaded audio of comedian Patrice O'Neal's appearance on The Black Phillip Show, during which he discusses tubgirl and other shock sites (shown below, left). On January 9th, 2016, YouTuber PewDiePie posted a video titled "Things You Should Never Google (Warning Gross) #2", in which he views the tubgirl image along with other shock media (shown below, right). Within three months, the video gained over 5.3 million views and 32,000 comments.

2022 Tubgirl TikToks

In March 2021, users on TikTok started posting about Tubgirl en masse due to a Don't Google trend that inspired curiosity. On March 14th, 2021, TikToker^[10] heloveskayyy posted a video in which she asked her followers to record themselves before and after searching for Tubgirl, earning roughly 22,800 likes in a year and a half (shown below, left).

Roughly a year later, in mid-2022, TikToker^[11] baileyis001_ posted a copycat video, earning roughly 4.6 million plays and 596,700 likes in two weeks (shown below, right). Baileyis001_'s video inspired lots of Tubgirl interest on TikTok.^[12]

Search Interest

The first spike in search queries for "tubgirl" in early 2016 coincides with the release of PewDiePie's "Things You Should Never Google (Warning Gross) #2" video. In March 2021, the 2016 seach interests were quadrupled.

External References