Get in losers, we're going hellmaxxing
This is my fault, isn't it.
Just 24 minutes after midnight on October 18, I got owned into oblivion.
I found out several hours later when people started sending me this tweet from Twitter user @wormwood_stars, assuming it was something real that I had published. And you know what? It could have been!
The tweet, a Photoshopped parody of an article from In The Know (on whose behalf I am not speaking — OK Zoomer is entirely unaffiliated with Yahoo … also unedited, feral, etc.) follows the format of a video script about a dangerous TikTok trend. The kind that I and my peers in the Digital Youth Culture Industrial Complex would have covered.
Of course, the TikTok trend mentioned, hellmaxxing, is not real. Thank you, Palmer Haasch from Insider, for actually debunking this as the rabid SEO-focused blogs haphazardly reposted some Urban Dictionary definition from 2019 without actually saying its NOT A THING. (Urban Dictionary is about as reliable of a source as random bathroom graffiti. I digress.)
If you’re new to TikTok or the world of parent-scaring media, the initial tell for this gorgeous piece of satire is the fact “hellmaxxing” has two x’s in it, which is, mmm, a lot… and also the word hell. (That’s not good for the algorithm! TikTokers would spell it “h311” or something.)
I know it’s Halloween, and I wouldn’t put it past those online mall goths to dabble in sacrilege, but come on. Humor-wise, this is a banger. Outside the realm of satire, this is the kind of idea that’s going straight to Crackle.
Anyway, an excerpt from the fictional masterpiece:
“The trend is largely popular in America, where police in Bensalem, Pennsylvania are warning parents and small business owners. Hellmaxxing is a bizarre new trend where teens attempt to commit ‘so many sins even the devil won’t have them.’”
It reads like an SNL sketch called “Frightening Teen Trends” that I often quote — “teens are drinking expired soup to get high … every teen is doing this and it WILL kill them.”
This is how local news handles youth trends quite frequently — see that one weed candy tweet and literally the entire vaping saga as an example.
Last year, I wrote about how teens — especially cool ones — activate a sense of jealousy and fear in us. That can easily beget sensationalized pieces about what a couple kids have done maybe once or twice. The stories activate our digital fight or flight, like beaning, which I believe was the basis for this tweet.
Here’s the problem, though. A couple kids get to beaning, it blows up, and suddenly we’re in a bean crisis. Can’t find beans anywhere, they’re banned from schools, Instacart starts sending me data about a 700% increase in bean purchases… Maybe it was a joke at first, then it became something to make fun of, but even if you’re making fun of it as you’re doing it … you’re still doing it. It’s a thing.
Remember Adrian’s Kickback, a meme-party that blew up to the extent that like 50 people got arrested? If you saw a local news report about Adrian’s Kickback before it actually happened, you would have laughed. But here we are.
In fact, let me take it further. Here’s a list of random TikTok trends that may have started as a joke among a handful of rascals but turned into a thing you actually have to be careful about:
Eating tide pods
Celebrating Rigatoni Pasta Day
Consuming protein powder raw
Getting zooted on Benadryl
Walking up a pyramid made of milk crates
Straight up just eating honey
Stealing stuff from your school bathroom
Actually, I wanna unpack the last one, because the trend is known as “devious licks,” and that sounds worse than hellmaxxing. I genuinely have never seen so many local news articles about a TikTok trend. Even today, you’ll find write-ups about how schools have faced thousands of dollars in damages and had to take major precautions because so many bathrooms had their urinals and soap dispensers stolen.
It may have started as a joke — two silly words in a TikTok post promoting bad (sinful?) behavior — but parents are, genuinely, concerned!!! And they should be.
You see, teenagers are teenagers and always have been teenagers and always will be teenagers. They do dumb stuff with their friends because other people are doing it. Adults do that, too — why do you think Dear Evan Hansen won the Tony? Regardless of age, TikTok rewards copycats with clout. Its algorithm feeds us what we’ve already seen and makes it look glamorous to participate.
I feel like it’s only a matter of time till #hellmaxxing has 1.1 million views from silly billies who wanna capitalize on a search opportunity or make fun of Millennials. I doubt it will have clergy concerned, but SOME youth pastor is gonna pick up on it and try to weasel it into his sermon notes, I know it.
Not yet, though.
That being said, and at the risk of being earnest online, maybe we should cut parents some slack over being worried about TikTok trends. You take normal, in-person peer pressure and let it snort some Benadryl and a tide pod and you’ve got TikTok in a nutshell. It’s a problem! Maybe not one so severe the devil won’t have you, but I don’t know. I’m not Dante or God.
In fact, I think encouraging parents to make sure their kids aren’t hellmaxxing or whatever is going to be hilarious. Make that the trend! Gently embarrass them into media literacy.
“Honey, did you finish your homework? I hope you haven’t committed so many sins that the devil won’t have you, like on the news….”
“Have you been … bOping? I don’t think you are, I just thought we should have that conversation, the school sent a note home…”
Anyway, that’s all for today. Be skeptical of viral media, be nice to your parents and always keep the clergy on their toes.
This is a supplementary edition of OK Zoomer. You’ll get the regular thing with all the links and stuff you like later this week.
i loved this so much