Weekly Internet Roundup: Chabad Tunnels, Josh Wine, and Golden Globes Slang

Hello, it's roundup time. The wider internet has been especially busy this week in bringing us one ridiculous viral phenomenon after the other, so I'll waste a minimum of words with introductions. Let's begin.

Did You Know That There's a Tunnel Under 770 Eastern Parkway

New York City has once again proved what a special place it is for generating viral content after tunnels were discovered under Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. Ten men were arrested on Monday for protesting against structural engineers who were attempting to fill the mysteriously (and illegally) excavated space.

This led to some pretty wacky videos that were seemingly begging to get posted to death, including one of a Hasidic man climbing out of a sewer grate that was an entrance to the tunnel. There was also an extremely Italian cop at the scene who became a meme in himself, and demented conspiracy theorists everywhere felt like all their Christmases had come at once. 

People floated all kinds of fanciful reasons for this bizarre occurrence, but it appears to be the doing of a splinter sect of the Chabad Lubavitch community who believe a former leader of the community is the Messiah — the truth is just as strange as fiction, I guess. 

The Week of Guys Being Dudes

There have been so many viral instances of men doing wacky things this week that there aren't enough subheadings for all of them. Two short days before the Chabad tunnel madness, a guy jumped naked into the fish tank in the Bass Pro Shops of Leeds, Alabama, spawning countless memes of him both in and out of the water. Then, there was the man who got stuck in a large vase at a New Year's party, who rose to prominence on Twitter this week after a thread detailing the ordeal went big time. As if that wasn't enough, a bunch of friends got everybody talking about the dangers of the bog after sharing a video of themselves messing around in one. Pick your fighter from the wild men of the January '24 internet.

Motherquake at the Golden Globes

Hollywood awards season often paves the way for some gigantic memes, and this year's Golden Globes have been no exception. Certain corners of Twitter really enjoyed the outfits worn by various female celebrities this year, and they expressed their appreciation in the most convoluted and off-the-wall way possible. While not all of these ladies won a statue, they did get bestowed the title of ‘mother’ and were gifted with some elaborate metaphors about the looks they served. It has to be seen to be believed.

I Got That Josh in Me

Forget Dry January, because a wine brand has managed to take over the hearts and minds of sh*tposters this week. What started out as a tweet praising the quality of a mid-range Merlot from Josh Wine snowballed into an unstoppable ironic meme about the new preferred poison of the internet. At first, wine snobs were perturbed at somebody making the claim that this wine was of any kind of quality, but that only intensified the posting about it. Of all the free marketing campaigns this brand could have had, this is definitely one of the weirdest.

That is everything that we are going to look at for now. Gotta be honest, it feels like it will be difficult for any other week in 2024 to bring such a high volume of internet ridiculousness. I'm sure some will try, though. Until next time!