Zillenials were the first generation to grow up in such a rapidly evolving digital world. Many of us missed out on the Myspace train but can distinctly remember every word to the 2010 Kesha Parody. Throughout the years, there have been some iconic memes, videos and moments that have both shaped and broke us.
Let’s look back on all of these cringeworthy and iconic moments from our virtual childhood:
Tampon Girl
The whole reason I’m writing this is because I came across this TikTok last night:
This whole situation was fully suppressed in the back of my mind, until last night. After seeing this girl, it all came back to me like a That’s So Raven vision. I could not believe how much of this I remembered off the top of my head. I knew her name; Giovanna Plowman, the twitter fight she had with Arianna Grande, how absurd her public Facebook was, and that gruesome video that started it all.
For those of you who don’t know what I’m talking about, here’s a quick synopsis of the “tampon girl” saga. Class act, Giovanna Plowman, posted a video back in 2013 of her taking out a bloody tampon and throwing it right into her mouth hole. This girl was WORLD FAMOUS for EATING HER OWN TAMPON, and us over stimulated prepubescent internet users could not get enough of it.
Everyone was talking about it, both online and in school. The more everyone talked about it, the more the story progressed. We had so many questions. The main question being WHY? And the second question was, WHO IS THIS GIRL? Everyone got to digging, and collectively found her public Facebook, which was in two words; a shit show. This was also the reason I got a Twitter account, because miss tampon girl found herself in a Twitter beef with a pre-super star; Arianna Grande. The whole thing was simply nuts.
Shovel Girls
“Shovel Girls” was one of the craziest viral “fight” videos I ever saw back in 2014. Much like Tampon Girl, we could not get enough of this video. Basically, these two troublesome hillbillies got into a heated argument which led to one of them getting knocked out cold WITH A SHOVEL. Imagine getting a METAL SHOVEL thrown from a far right to your DOME PIECE. There is no way that poor girl was ever the same after that. There should never be a point in a young girl’s life that you think you need to terminate someone via shovel. I remember prime time news ATE THIS UP.
For some reason, Dr. Phil loves to give outrageous teenage girls an extra 15 minutes of fame. So naturally, the girl who threw the shovel, Emily, appeared on the show two years later. It’s honestly a comical segment:
Miss Thor, goes on the show to win back America using the sympathy angle. My favorite quote from this has to be “I can’t talk to anybody about anything because they say ‘Oh are you gunna get the shovel.’” Aw, poor angsty teen Emily. I get it we all make stupid mistakes when were kids, but I personally never got to the shovel throwing point in my life.
Blue Waffle
If you read these two words and don’t know what I’m talking about, google it right now before reading the rest of this. I’ll wait.
Okay, now that you’re emotionally scarred like the rest of us, you know how betrayed us 6th graders felt when we had to clear our search history for the first time after seeing that. It’s a right of passage if you will. Like reading The Great Gasby in high school, it’s a universal experience for young curious minds.
Dramatic Cue Card Stories
This was a weird time in life where everyone was sad in one way or another. While we all collectively felt dead inside, people would make and watch these videos instead of going to therapy.
They were usually in black and white and had that song from “Cyberbully” playing in the background for dramatic effect. More times than not, these people thought their life was so much worse than it really was. But we still devoured this content.
Mainly popular with Tumblr users, these videos either made you feel better or worse about your own situation. I understand these were deeply personal videos and a lot of them touched on some very sensitive topics, but looking back they were a little over the top.
Overtime, people finally started to realize how ridiculous these videos were and began making parodies, which were middle school humor gold.
#Cut4Bieber
Mental illness is never a funny subject (unless you’re like me and you need humor to cope.) With that being said, this was an absolutely wild and insane time for the internet.
As I was doing a little research to fill you guys in on the topic, I found an article which says this whole thing was a hoax. But at the time, I was 13, and this whole thing seemed “legit”. From my perspective, Justin Bieber could do no wrong. But according to my peers, Bieber smoking weed equaled inflicting self harm. I couldn’t wrap my little brain around it. There were countless self explanatory pictures under the hashtag “Cut4Bieber.” It was astonishing. It’s even crazier to me now, that after all this time…I never realized how this was all an elaborate scheme formed by hundreds of fake users all for a chuckle. A sick and unusual “prank” to say the least.
Shoes
When it comes to iconic videos of our childhood, I cannot write a post without including Shoes. To this day, I still know every word. It’s crazy to look back and think this was:
1) Quality entertainment
2) Professionally made
3) Top tier comedy
I must have watched this, along with “Muffins” around 13,000 times. Every once and a while I’ll look this bad boy up to humble myself, I think everyone should do the same.
Scary Maze Game
It was honestly mind blowing to me that you could pull this prank on so many people. I couldn’t believe just how many people had yet to do this prior to me showing them. The person’s reaction was priceless…everytime. Playing this now, seems like some unethical 70’s psych experiment.
