Monday, January 4, 2016

My 5 predictions for 2016 social media "challenges"

The rise of the internet and social media, with platforms such as YouTube and Vine, has resulted in the phenomena of extremely stupid people trying to become famous via viral trends. Perhaps the dumbest of these trends are the myriad of "challenges" all over Vine, Instagram, FaceBook, and YouTube. These "challenges" are some of the stupidest fucking things I've ever heard of. We have the Cinnamon challenge, in which people will put a whole spoonful of cinnamon in their mouths and won't drink anything for about 60 seconds. We have the Banana sprite challenge, in which people quickly scarf down two bananas and then a whole can of Sprite. The challenge is that they can't vomit. We have the fire challenge, in which people literally light themselves on fire and record themselves on video. There was the Kylie Jenner Lip Challenge, in which inconceivably stupid teenagers...just read this. The most recent of these challenges was the condom challenge, in which you fill a condom up with water, and then drop it on your head, potentially resulting it getting stuck on your head. You just...you just can't make this shit up.

I can only imagine what new "challenges" will take the world of social media by storm in 2016. I've come up with five predictions:

Number 1: The Bleach Challenge

In this challenge, the participant must down an entire cup of bleach without vomiting. No water dilution is allowed, it must be a pure cup of bleach. This may sound crazy, but this is the internet, where some people actually believe that autism can be cured by bleach enemas. And no, I didn't make that up. 

Number 2: The Electricity Challenge

The participants must grab onto a high voltage wire and hold on for as long as they can. If you let go, you lose. If you win, you're probably dead. But at least you became a viral sensation!

Number 3: The Cliff Challenge

You must jump off a cliff. The higher the cliff, the greater the challenge. Make sure you have a camera both at the top and the bottom of the cliff so we can confirm that you did this legitimately. We don't a repeat of the moon landing debacle!

Number 4: The Blood Challenge

This one is good because it's a scientific experiment! Give yourself a wound and lose a large amount of blood. The trick is, you must collect this blood in some containers. After you stop bleeding, you must drink the blood that you lost. Now the blood is back inside your body! If you wanted to know if drinking blood will replenish any lost blood, the only way to know for sure is by doing this challenge!

Number 5: The Paint Challenge

Hey kids, remember in Goldfinger when that woman was spray-painted gold? Why not do something similar, except use actual paint and a brush? Paint your whole body many different colors! Even the little ones can join in! Parents, you no longer have to lose your minds when your little ones are painting themselves rather than the walls!

There are many, many other ideas for social media challenges, but few of them require actual talent or effort because those things are too hard for most social media wannabe superstars.