It isn’t often in these harsh times that the world gives us something to smile about, but if you Google image search the word “idiot” pictures of President Trump miraculously appear.
It’s as if the Google algorithms feel the pain of the oppressed. It’s as if the spirits of our ancestors have infused the Google matrix to insert the universal image of a human colostomy bag. If the world can’t accept that President Trump is indeed the face of an idiot, at least the cyberworld gets it.
While I personally would like to give this win to the ancestors, according to the Guardian, some Reddit users figured out how to manipulate Google’s image search to ensure that President Trump’s face appears when you search the word “idiot.”
They should be blessed, too.
Remember the band Green Day? (Don’t worry most people don’t.) Anyway, back when Nirvana was a thing, Green Day had a song called “American Idiot,” which had a bit of a resurgence recently when protestors adopted the song as an anthem during the president’s visit to the U.K.
I must admit that while I’m familiar with the song, I’ve never truly listened to the lyrics but holy fuck is this thing accurate, just take a gander below:
Don’t wanna be an American idiot
Don’t want a nation under the new media
And can you hear the sound of hysteria?
The subliminal mind-fuck America
Welcome to a new kind of tension
All across the alien nation
Where everything isn’t meant to be okay
Television dreams of tomorrow
We’re not the ones who’re meant to follow
For that’s enough to argue
Well maybe I’m the faggot America
I’m not a part of a redneck agenda
Now everybody do the propaganda
And sing along to the age of paranoia
Welcome to a new kind of tension
All across the alien nation
Where everything isn’t meant to be okay
Television dreams of tomorrow
We’re not the ones who’re meant to follow
For that’s enough to argue
Don’t wanna be an American idiot
One nation controlled by the media
Information Age of hysteria
It’s calling out to idiot America
Proving that Russians aren’t the only ones that know how to manipulate a system, according to Fortune, Reddit users began “upvoting a post that contained Trump’s photo alongside the word, in order to tell Google that the post’s page is popular and therefore probably relevant to people searching for “idiot.” As Fortune notes, “Of course, every time an article such as the Guardian’s—or this one—appears, it reinforces the trend.”
This is called Google bombing and while I believe in nonviolence ... Google bomb the shit out of this one!
Fortune notes that while this is super funny, it’s not new.
The first Google bomb allegedly occurred in 1999, when a search for “more evil than Satan himself” would bring up Microsoft’s website. Other examples since then have included returning British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s biography for the search term “liar,” having a search for “terrorist sympathizer” throw up Bill O’Reilly’s homepage, and giving those searching for “dangerous cult” a top link for the Scientology website (thank the hacktivist group Anonymous for that one.)
Very memorably, in 2003 the sex columnist Dan Savage responded to deeply homophobic remarks from politician Rick Santorum by creating a website that ensured searches for Santorum’s name would throw up the definition: “Santorum: The frothy mix of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex.” The reputation of Santorum, who did not find this funny, never quite recovered.
Apparently, Google bombing is a bipartisan attack device that isn’t just used by leftists with a communist agenda.
Members of the TheDonald Reddit forum, because that is a thing, manipulated the system to cause images of Bill Clinton to appear every time some searched the word “rapists.” They also caused CNN’s logo to become the first image that appeared anytime someone searched the term “fake news.”
This is going to die out, according to Fortune. Trump’s photo will only stay relevant as the top image whenever someone searches “idiot” as long as users keep the schtick up. Once they stop, the algorithms will go back to normal and images of Rand Paul, Trey Gowdy and Paul Ryan will appear whenever someone image searches “idiot.”
Much like the Obamas, good things don’t last long in this country, but for now, we can all enjoy the face of idiocy in cyberworld.
Google away my friends, we earned it.