The big pop culture news this week for young people is the release of Beyoncé’s newest album, which is also the biggest news in pop culture for older generations. Cowboy Carter is a rare piece of pop culture that is on everyone’s radar, so I thought I’d try to figure out why this one singer can pull off what no one else is able to. There’s also a new, gross word to learn, and we can all marvel at the ingenuity of young people when they try to skirt online rules against sexy content.
What Beyoncé means to Generation Z
Late last week, Beyoncé released her eight studio album, a country-inspired collection called Cowboy Carter. The singer/songwriter/icon is 42 years old, a late Millennial, but she’s not dismissed by young people. If you judge by online response to Cowboy Carter, The Queen transcends generational divides as thoroughly as she transcended musical divides by taking over country music. There’s a TikTok dance trend, with vids like these gaining millions of views, and Gen Z is even getting into country music, with diehard, not-country young people agreeing with critics that the single “Texas Hold ‘em” is a banger and the album is killer. It’s not just the first single; the internet has become obsessed with her new take on Dolly Parton’s “Jolene,” too. For cultural comparison, Beyoncé is like mid-career Madonna, but more so. She’s an icon who’s still relevant, and if there’s any importance at all to popular culture, the release of Cowboy Carter feels like a page being turned: Other than the usual grousing dipshits, everyone of every age, race, and creed, is into Beyoncé’s new album. I even like it, and I hate everything.
Butt-based greenscreen and Twitch’s cat-and-mouse culture war
Credit: Morgpie/Twitch
Streaming service Twitch, known mostly for streaming gaming content, has been engaged in a cat-and-mouse war with some of its users for years. At issue: Twitch’s policy toward risqué content on streams. The latest salvo in the battle: Twitch has banned users from streaming content on their butts.
About two weeks ago, innovative Twitch streamer/cosplayer Morgpie skirted Twitch’s content policy against nudity by using a greenscreen to display gameplay footage on her hinder. This weekend, Twitch responded by announcing: “Starting on Friday March 29th, content that focuses on intimate body parts for a prolonged period of time will not be allowed.”
This isn’t the first time that Morgpie inspired Twitch to change its content policy. Back in 2023, she started appearing in streams topless, but framed so that users couldn’t quite see the forbidden parts of her breasts. Morgpie was temporarily banned, and Twitch updated its policy on sexual content.
This led to streamers using censor bars, something called “Show hole meta.” Even earlier than that, back in 2021, Twitch cracked down on Hot Tub streams, while acknowledging how difficult it is to decide whether sexy content is too sexy.
What is “jelqing”?
Like “Looksmaxxing,” “bone smashing,” and “mewing,” jelqing comes from the moldy and disturbing world of incel culture. Put simply, it’s penis-stretching. Jelqers either pull their junk manually or use devices to do the stretching—this isn’t a medically approved procedure, so there’s no set of best practices. The idea is that the trauma creates micro-tears in the skin and the penis grows back bigger. As for whether it works or not, the smart money is on “fuck no.” There are anecdotal reports online of jelqers who say it works, but sometimes people lie online. I can’t find any reliable data on the effectiveness of the procedure, and urologists point out that it can lead to the formation of scar tissue, pain, erectile disfunction and and Peyronie’s Disease.
Gay furries hack church, purchase inflatable sea lions
SiegedSec, a group of self-proclaimed gay furries, claim that they breached the security of the River Valley Church in Burnsville, Minnesota. On a recent Telegram post, SiegedSec accused a church pastor of making anti-trans statements, posted links to church members’ emailed prayer requests, and used the church’s funds to send them 100 inflatable sea lions.
“We hacked their accounts and spent thousands of dollars on inflatable sea lions (we couldn’t donate it), and we have leaked 15k+ user data :3,” the hackers posted.
River Valley’s head god-botherer, Rob Ketterling, is active on Twitter, spreading the weird idea that Joe Biden declared Easter Sunday a transgender holiday. I hope he enjoys his inflatable sea lions.
Viral video of the week: Duck Song 4
This week’s viral video is the fourth installment of the Duck Song, an animated video for kids that was viewed nearly two million times in its first week of release. The Duck Song is a generational dividing line. If you’re under a certain age, you’ve seen it. If you’re over that age (and childless) you haven’t.
YouTuber forrestfire101 released the first Duck Song video 15 years ago, and it’s been viewed 625 million times since. It’s impossible to explain exactly why. It’s amusing enough as a story/joke, the song is catchy enough, and the crude animation is cute, but that can be said for uncountable millions of videos aimed at children that are posted on YouTube. For some reason, The Duck Song captured the imagination of children and YouTube’s algorithm to the point of being a universally recognizable thing for a generation.
Duck Song’s creator wisely opted to limit the release of new installments instead of flooding the zone with Duck crap when it was first released, thus avoiding turning it into a flash in the pan. They also didn’t try to expand, change, broaden, or otherwise tamper with the original video’s simplicity. So the Duck Song videos became a universally recognized thing to at least two generations—fans of the original Duck Song have children of their own now, and are no doubt sharing it with them before they waddle away.
