Welcome to the Friday edition of Internet Insider, where we review the week online.
TODAY:
- Why everyone is pondering an orb
- Trisha Paytas addresses Hanukkah TikToks
- People are making memes about rumors that Rihanna is pregnant
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BREAK THE INTERNET
Why everyone is pondering an orb
We’re at that weird period between Thanksgiving and Christmas; a time when people take time off work and get ready for the new year to begin. It’s head empty season. No intellectual thoughts, just vibes. In other words, it’s the perfect time for a new dumb meme to take off. Yes, I’m talking about “pondering my orb.” The meme began when a Twitter user posted an illustration of a wizard pensively looking into an orb, with the caption, “pondering my orb.” The Illustration comes from the cover of a 1993 supplement for Middle-earth Role-Playing (MERP), titled Valar and Maiar, as Known Your Meme reports.
If you’re a Lord of the Rings fan, you’ll recognize the wizard as Saruman and the orb as a palantír, which can show events. But if you’re not, well, then it’s just an orb. And that is the brilliance of the meme: You don’t need to know any pop culture references to understand most versions of it. All you need to know is that if you have an orb, you can spend time pondering it. The meme has inspired photoshopped edits and fan art.
“Pondering my orb” is reminiscent of a meme from 2017, in which Twitter users went into a frenzy over a photo of Trump touching a glowing orb. So the lesson here is that people love orbs.
—Tiffany Kelly, culture editor
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TIKTOK
Trisha Paytas addresses Hanukkah TikToks
Former Frenemies podcast co-host Trisha Paytas addressed those “gatekeeping religions and beliefs” in response to criticism of a recent series of Hanukkah videos.
Paytas, who is engaged to Israeli artist Moses Hacmon, has been documenting Hanukkah on TikTok, starting with a video captioned “Me trying to seduce my Israeli husband.” The TikTok has more than 7 million views. “This doesn’t feel right idk,” said one commenter.
On Wednesday, Paytas appeared to respond to the criticism: “It really sucks those gatekeeping religions and beliefs. RELIGION. CAN. NOT. BE. APPROPRIATED. culture can. Relics can. Apparel can. But if someone is seeking multiple religions to find their truth and purpose ….idk. Maybe just let them? God is for EVERYONE.”
Read the full article here.
—Audra Schroeder, senior writer
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CELEBRITIES
People are making memes about rumors that Rihanna is pregnant
People are speculating that Rihanna is pregnant—again. This time, the rumor started after the singer was declared a National Hero of Barbados on Tuesday. Twitter users reacted to the news with disbelief and, of course, memes.
After being deceived before, many users refused to believe the rumor and instead poked fun at how often it’s spread. “Rihanna just became the first person to be pregnant for 6 consecutive years,” one user wrote. Another tweeted, “Does Rihanna know she’s pregnant?” with a picture of a worn-out Bugs Bunny drunk on carrot juice.
Read the full article here.
—Sabine Joseph, reporting intern
MEME OF THE WEEK
The yassify meme is still going strong.
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