A brief history of celebrities getting dragged on Twitter

I don’t know about you, but I use Twitter for a lot of things. These include sycophantically liking the tweets of people I admire (both professionally and aesthetically) in the hope they’ll one day notice me and be my friend, stealing jokes from the depths of Tumblr and repurposing them to pass them off as my own fire brand of online humor, and lastly – most importantly – watching famous people get absolutely wrecked in 140 characters or less.

It doesn’t really matter who they are, it could be a semi-well known alt-right white van man who has one of those “come and have a go if you think you’re hard enough, ISIS” bios. It can be a past it politician who’s foolishly followed a camgirl account in his darkest moments and has now been found out. It’s best though when it’s a universally liked, national treasure level celebrity.

It’s hard to say why we enjoy watching celebrities – the same people we’ll pay to see in a movie or at a gig, the same people we might have once bought a poster of or worn an ironic t-shirt for – being ruined by egg profile picc’ed weirdos who probably never leave the house IRL, but it’s probably got something to do with getting a sick kick out of watching them being dragged down to our level, the unverified normies, the poor, unwashed proles who are supposed to consume their products and smile and nod. Basically, life is a slog and we all need some light relief from time to time. If you need it today, read this abridged history of celebs being dragged on Twitter and feel better.

Namaste.

Lena Dunham

Honestly it’s hard to pick just one ridiculous moment from the ‘I FEEL VERY ATTACKED’ fest that is Lena Dunham’s public life, but my personal favourite is when she accused Odell Beckham of ignoring her at the Met Gala last year because he sat next to her and didn’t immediately congratulate her on being woke at all times. In her newsletter she wrote: “I was sitting next to Odell Beckham Jr., and it was so amazing because it was like he looked at me and he determined I was not the shape of a woman by his standards. He was like, ‘That’s a marshmallow. That’s a child. That’s a dog.’ It wasn’t mean – he just seemed confused.

“The vibe was very much like, ‘Do I want to f— it? Is it wearing a … yep, it’s wearing a tuxedo. I’m going to go back to my cell phone.’ It was like we were forced to be together, and he literally was scrolling Instagram rather than have to look at a woman in a bow tie. I was like, ‘This should be called the Metropolitan Museum of Getting Rejected by Athletes.”

Unsurprisingly Dunham’s razor sharp insight into the minds of all red-blooded men didn’t go unnoticed by Twitter.

Donald Trump

We all know what happened here. Let’s just revisit the great jokes that came from the most powerful man in the world spelling the word “coverage” incorrectly because he’s a huge idiot baby.

Sarah Michelle Gellar

When George Michael died last December, it was a dark day. The only beacon of light to make it slightly better was Sarah Michelle Gellar, bless her heart, tweeting about how much she’ll miss Boy George. She meant well.

What followed was a bunch of “also not dead” Georges.

Jennifer Lawrence and the Hawaiian people

When Jennifer ‘I’m so random and relatable’ Lawrence boasted about rubbing her ass on a sacred, ancient Hawaiian rock while shooting her new film while on the Graham Norton show, she probably didn’t expect a shit show. But the people of Twitter had had enough of her bullshit. And they let her know about it.

Eventually, the furore got so intense that Jennifer Lawrence had to apologize. In a statement she said: “I meant absolutely no disrespect to the Hawaiian people. I really thought that I was being self deprecating about the fact that I was “the curse”, but I understand the way it was perceived was not funny and I apologize if I offended anyone.”

But Twitter never forgets.

Kourtney Kardashian

It must be hard to be a Kardashian. Can’t launch a make-up line without someone accusing you of blackface. Can’t tweet about how much you enjoyed the film Get Out without people dragging you on Twitter. To be fair, Kourtney Kardashian could have tried for a more heartfelt or subtle message about how much she liked the film, but she chose this.

Not that bad. But people immediately saw the comedic opportunity and they pounced (and yes, obviously there were jokes about Kanye being stuck in the sunken place).

Bow Wow and his fake riches

This is a big thing to say, but I mean it with every fibre of my being: the Lil Bow Wow challenge is the best meme to have ever happened to the internet in the entire history of the information superhighway. Quick history lesson: it all started when Bow Wow Instagrammed a picture claiming to be about to board his private jet, but he was spotted by a fan in economy, and the Snapchat spread pretty quickly.

Faster than you can say “inconsequential internet boasting about wealth and power” the Bow Wow Challenge had become an amazingly creative meme.

Iggy Azalea about literally anything

Look, the internet really really doesn’t like Iggy Azalea.

@rosielanners