The Weekly Discourse: Dispatches From The December Perineum

The time between Christmas and New Year's, aka the "December Perineum," is always dull to the point of surreal, and folks, if that ain't a description of Twitter…

The Big Bang of 2020 has rolled to a close with a comparative whimper in the past week, as Twitter users enjoy the Christmas afterglow and look forward to what surely must be a better 2021. A pair of shallow micro-scandals rocked the site this week, as Alec Baldwin's wife Hilaria was exposed to not be as Spanish as she seemed and a Lucasfilms exec made a joke that ignited the Star Wars fandom (because what doesn't?). Still, in comparison to the rest of the year, these are but drops in the comprehensive ocean of 2020.

Twitter has otherwise been pretty dull this week, perhaps as posters everywhere rest their weary brains before entering another year of high quality hot takes. Hell, we even had sex scenes in movies discourse again. Still, the week was not without its chuckle-worthy facepalms. This week: Richard Dawkins asked the Big Questions, a liberal came up with the new worst name for the Joe Biden era, and the year's stupidest meme came back to the platform.

Richard Dawkins Has A Big Thought

A lot of shit has been given to Neil Degrasse Tyson over the years for being the most insufferable science guy on Twitter, but Richard Dawkins, inventor of the modern meme, has had multiple brilliant Twitter moments over the years, possibly topped by the Would you touch a poop for $20 incident. This week, Richard dove into his mind palace and emerged with a Really Makes You Think question that delighted Twitter users.

If lions were discovered weaving antelope-catching nets ten lion-lengths wide, it would be headline news. Yet spiders weave intricate insect-catching nets hugely bigger than themselves, and we treat it as commonplace. What’s the difference?

— Richard Dawkins (@RichardDawkins) December 28, 2020

This is an astoundingly silly tweet from one of the alleged smartest people on the planet. What seals it is that he comes so close to answering his own question. Yes, if a lion made a net after centuries of not doing that, it would be headline news, while spiders have been making webs their whole lives. The difference is, we're used to it.

The tweet was highly mocked for its galaxy brain, first-time-high idea, receiving a quote-tweet to retweet ratio of 5,400 to 1,700. More fun than Dawkins tweet were the pithy responses it inspired.

This says a lot about society pic.twitter.com/49bghZaB4y

— Justin Whang 🐙 (@JustinWhang) December 29, 2020

If hyenas were discovered telling you what they want, what they really, really want, it would be headline news. Yet the Spice Girls having been doing that for years and we treat it as commonplace. What’s the difference?

— Rita Panahi (@RitaPanahi) December 28, 2020

Sarah's Awesomeism

If you're a Bernie Sanders fan or just not super hot on Joe Biden, you're well aware of just how cringey megafans of the President-elect can be. Let us not forget the immortal Biden-themed parody of "Everybody" by the Backstreet Boys performed by some of the whitest teens in history. However, a new tweet has emerged from to potentially take the top spot in Biden-cringe on Twitter.

Bernie was socialism. President Biden is an Awesomist.You'll love Awesomeism.

— 🌊Sarah🌊 (@BidenIsMyPOTUS) December 29, 2020

The tweet comes from a user named Sarah with the appropriate handle @BidenIsMyPOTUS. She was responding to Nikki Haley doing typical Republican fear-mongering over socialism in the Democratic Party, to which Sarah noted that Joe Biden isn't socialist (true), but that he's "awesomeist."

Regardless of your political leanings, this is a miserable way to describe a politician, particularly one as generally milquetoast as Joe Biden, who was critiqued for running a campaign promising a civil counterpart to Trump but little in the way of radical change. With a roughly 4-1 quote-tweet to retweet ratio, Twitter users were quite vocal in expressing their astonishment with the phrase "awesomeism."

i am going to throw myself into oncoming traffic https://t.co/EbbKHLNBxS

— Femboy Destiny (@FemboyDestiny) December 29, 2020

Still, what topped it off was Sarah's estimation of her critics.

I love that a bunch of vegans that lack the upper body strength to shoulder a weapon think they're going to execute someone. You're adorable, huh? 😅🤗💙 pic.twitter.com/W0PuHo3ZtU

— 🌊Sarah🌊 (@BidenIsMyPOTUS) December 30, 2020

Who's ready for the Awesomeist years?

The Return Of "My Noun? Adjective" Jokes

While there were some bad tweets this week, the worst development of the December Perineum was the return of the worst meme of 2020: 'My Nouns? Adjective' Title Parodies. The format originally hit in July of this year with book titles, as nerds simply couldn't get enough of putting the words of book titles in different orders. Last week, it hit Music Twitter.

My Halen? Van. https://t.co/5ypouQTANF

— Rob Anderson 🇺🇸 (@RobAnderson2018) December 28, 2020

Let's get this out of the way: this is an abysmal meme format. It is the lowest-level form of joke I can think of, if the poster even succeeds in making a joke at all. While you could argue formulations like My Nails? Nine Inches work, most of the time people have stuggled to grasp even the basic premise of the format, which is simply to switch the adjectives and the verbs in the title. Tweets like "My Halen? Van" don't even clear that embarrassingly low bar of humor.

My Pistols? Sex. https://t.co/OPwJTDDzQP

— Stephen King (@StephenKing) December 29, 2020

Like, look at this! This doesn't mean anything! Even Mashable, thanklessly tasked with writing about the meme like it is an internet development worth covering, could barely squeeze out anything positive to say about it. "Is it the smartest meme Twitter has ever seen? Probably not," they wrote. "But it's certainly one way to while away the time until 2021 arrives."

Backlash to the format thankfully came in hot, as more people caught on that this meme sucks ass.

not this again https://t.co/iknDFotZ59

— bromf (@bromf3) December 28, 2020

the my "part of a band name?" "other part of a band name" is the absolute worst meme this website has produced, just truly bottom tier shit

— metal dot txt (@metaltxt) December 29, 2020

if you do the “my band name? band name” meme i am unfollowing, i just can’t have so many shit tweets in my timeline

— keegan (@FranziaMom) December 29, 2020

The resurgence of this meme is a miserable way to end 2020. At least in that way, it seems fitting.

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The Weekly Discourse is a look at some of the spiciest hot takes on Twitter from the past week that may not have generated memes but were definitely bonkers.