"Hi family! Today at work I made a cappuccino inside a bell pepper.10/10 ❤️❤️"

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First, Here Is, Without Question, The Worst Food Video I’ve Ever Seen

My friend Cates sent this to me on Tumblr and I’ve been furious about it all week. Here’s a link to the original post on Facebook. The “recipe” is, as I wrote at the top there, the worst thing I’ve ever seen. It’s basically some kind of disgusting fish casserole made of crackers. I want to break this down step-by-step so that you all have to experience the same level of psychic damage that I have.

First, the recipe asks you spread a bunch of egg whites and mayonnaise on the first layer of crackers. This, I suppose, is fine. But this is the last normal thing that happens in this video.

It then asks you to mix a bunch of canned fish with mayonnaise in a bowl.

It doesn’t say what kind of fish, only that it should come from a can. And then the “recipe” asks you to spread your fish-mayo slime onto a second layer of crackers.

Congratulations, you made cat food. The “recipe” then continues like this, adding layers of mayo, fish, lettuce, and grated cheese.

Look at this thing. I hate it.

Think about the smell. The disgusting sheen of the mayonnaise. I imagine that when you press down on your awful fish pile to apply more cheese it makes the same sound a fetid swamp does when your boot hits the mud. This is an abomination. It’s practically gurgling. Now, you might be thinking, “ok, well, maybe if you baked this, maybe it would become less disgusting.” No! You would be wrong. There’s no baking in this video. They put tomatoes slices on it, cut up the fish pile, and serve it. That’s it!

God, I’m so angry about this thing. I almost want to try and make it just to fully realize the impotent rage I felt watching it. Here’s a perfect distillation of what makes this video so horrible by Tumblr user nitrosplicer:

Speaking Of Disgusting Things To Consume: “The Dewgarita”

Unlike the Cookist fish pile, I might be OK with the Red Lobster Dewgarita. Mountain Dew is surprisingly OK as a mixer! In fact, the soda was originally developed to cut whiskey. Fun Mountain Dew fact for you.

Per the press release for the Dewgarita, Nelson Griffin, Red Lobster senior vice president and chief supply chain officer, said, “The DEW Garita is the first delicious taste of the types of inspired menu items to come.” Which honestly, sounds like a threat. It will also be only served at Red Lobster, which means, to try it, you’ll have to break quarantine.

We talk a lot about how America in 2020 is a lot like the movie Idiocracy, but I’m not sure even Idiocracy would have included a “going to Red Lobster amid the deadly pandemic to drink the Mountain Dew booze” plot point. Apparently, the “suggested pairing” for the Dewgarita is Cheddar Bay Biscuits. Sure why not!

If the Dewgarita doesn’t sound like your jam, Taco Bell just announced a Jalapeño Noir wine. We live in hell.

The Undertale 5th Anniversary Concert Is Extremely Fun

The concert was actually recorded in Tokyo back in 2019, but it was streamed Tuesday in honor of Undertale’s 5th anniversary. Full disclaimer: I have tried and failed to finish Undertale multiple times. I’ve been told that the game is a bit of an acquired taste. Maybe I’ll make completing it my next manic quarantine project. Either way, I love the music from it and these concert arrangements by the MUSIC Engine orchestra are gorgeous. In case you’re wondering, here’s a link directly to the start of “Megalovania”. Also, here’s a good tweet from Undertale creator Toby Fox:

A New Upcoming Reactionary Movement Venn Diagram

Long-time Garbage Day readers know I’m a sucker for a good “trying to predict how the internet will influence culture” thing, especially when it’s in Venn diagram form. In my various travels around the web in the last six months I’ve definitely noticed the same trends that this Venn diagram is describing. So let’s pull this thing apart.

The Satanic panic AirBnb thread described in the chart is an extremely messy story. VICE wrote it up and then got called out for how they wrote it up. I don’t really want to wade too deep into the back and forth there, but I do think the whole debacle speaks to a larger level of mystical thinking and paranoia happening in America right now on all sides of the political alignment chart. The sky is literally red with fire and invisible death stalks our cities. People are scared right now. And also online witchcraft is having a really huge moment. Reality feels as if it’s bending.

Which leads us to QAnon. I think we’re reaching a point with QAnon where it’s becoming too large and unorganized to maintain its original shape — not that it has had much of one to begin with. Like the later months of Occupy Wall Street, where the leaderless decentralized coalition of 4chan trolls, hackers, tankies, independent journalists, and crust punks began to turn against each other and break apart, I think QAnon will start to have huge schisms soon, as well. If I had to put my money on which outgrowth will win over the rest, I’d say pastel QAnon.

Which would fit perfectly with the growing TERF (trans-exclusionary radical feminist) movement, largely led by a bunch of columnists in the UK, but taking root in the US, as well. It feels as if it’s become the real elephant in the room of culture over the last six-to-nine months. In the US, most of the TERF discourse has centered around JK Rowling being horrible, which I think has helped Americans address the issue a bit, but it’s not going away. And because it is so heavily-focused in the US around Harry Potter, I think it’s super likely it’ll collide with the new wave of militancy that’s happening in fandom communities.

I touched on this a few weeks back, writing about the “ethical cannibal” working at Cartoon Network. There’s this extremely vocal wing of sex negativity happening across a lot of fandom communities right now. My theory is that it’s Gen Z reacting to years of abuse, grooming, and over-sexualization in online communities like Tumblr during the late-00s and early-2010s. There really weren’t a lot of boundaries between older and younger fans and I think that has really led to a desire among Gen Z to carve out smaller, more private and secure spaces online to interact, while also attacking any perceived abuse they spot on public platforms like Twitter. Regardless of why it’s happening, though, the sexual policing is evolving incredibly quickly. It’s even happening on 4chan.

So now that we’ve surveyed all the bubbles, let’s put it all together: Online mysticism and platform-driven occultism will collide with the fanaticism of sex-negative fandom communities, a growing wave of anti-trans rhetoric, and the paranoia of Instagram-friendly QAnon conspiracy theories to create a puritanical political movement focused on rooting out “sexual deviancy,” most likely starting via a harassment campaign targeting the creators of young adult entertainment, a la gamergate. Let’s check back in on this in a few months and see how things have progressed.

Also, here’s a good Twitter thread also exploring some of these ideas.

OK, Wait, Here’s Another Bad Food Thing

I saw this picture on Reddit’s r/ShittyFoodPorn and I decided I had to go find the original post on Facebook. It was shared to a private Facebook Group called “A Group where we all Pretend to be a Family,” which I joined this morning and was luckily immediately accepted into. The questions it made me answer to join, though, were WILD:

It seems like there’s some real weird stuff going down in this group.

Not sure I like the sound of being “birthed” or whatever. The group describes itself as “A Place for Humans, Ants, Ant Eaters, Gibberish Speakers, Inmates, Guards, Middle Aged Men, Zombies, Offended Moms, Frogs, Bees, and Everything in Between.We are the Pretend Family. We hate being related, but nothing can change that.” Which really only just inspires more questions.

Anyways, as for the bell pepper cappuccino, the comments underneath it are a mix of people saying “I hate white people” (fair), “I want to die,” and “Does it taste good?” Which I’m also curious about!

And Finally, Here’s Just A Real Good Old Fashioned Cat Video

P.S. here’s a video of liberal politicians having fun online.

***All typos in this newsletter are on purpose actually***