Chipotle Ruins Thanksgiving For Everyone And More Of This Week's 'One Main Character'
Every day, somebody says or does something that earns them the scorn of the internet. Here at Digg, as part of our mission to curate what the internet is talking about right now, we rounded up the main characters on Twitter from this past week and held them accountable for their actions.
This week's characters include a financial news website that claimed "average Americans" are paying $90 for a bottle of wine, a woman who posted the worst Thanksgiving delicacy imaginable, a conservative news editor with the pettiest scoop about Vice President Kamala Harris and a a weirdly menacing Chipotle ad.
Saturday
MarketWatch
The character: MarketWatch, a financial-news website operated by Dow Jones & Co, moral panic generator.
The plot: On Saturday, MarketWatch tweeted a story claiming that "Average Americans are paying as much as $100 to $200 for a single concert ticket, $90 for a bottle of wine, and $5 a gallon for gas."
The repercussion: Twitter cried foul on MarketWatch for wildly exaggerating that inflation had caused "average Americans" to pay upwards of $90 for a bottle of wine. MarketWatch's botched numbers became a trending topic as netizens poked fun at the financial site for their bad math.
After the blowback from the Twittersphere, MarketWatch deleted their tweet and issued a correction to their original story.
"A previous version of this report inaccurately implied that $5-a-gallon gasoline, $90 bottles of wine and $200 concert tickets were typical purchases of late among average Americans. The story has been corrected."
Fox Business's Brie Stimson reported that MarketWatch updated their article to say the "national average gas price is currently $3.41."
Sunday
Kari Steele
The character: Kari Steele, reporter for ABC15 Arizona, pickle enthusiast.
The plot: In the lead-up to Thanksgiving, Steele tweeted a cursed image of a "cranberry and pickle pie" — which appeared to consist of a cranberry pie topped with slices of pickle.
The repercussion: Steele's abominable pastry dish went viral on Twitter, where it was universally panned as some type of crime against humanity.
Tuesday
Brent Scher
The character: Brent Scher, executive editor of the conservative news outlet Washington Free Beacon, pan purchase police.
The plot: Scher published a "breaking investigative exclusive" that Vice President Kamala Harris "dropped nearly $600" on pots and pans at the E. Dehillerin Cookware Shop while she was on a diplomatic trip in Paris, France.
"Spending spree at French boutique comes as US families fret over cost of Thanksgiving dinner," the Free Beacon trumpeted.
Quelle horreur.
The repercussion: Scher's revelation about Vice President Harris's pricey pan purchase sparked mockery across the internet as politicos roasted the conservative outlet for making hay out of a purchase she made using her own money.
Food Network chef Ted Allen called the so-called bombshell report a "bumbling story" and commended Vice President Harris for her cookware savviness.
Thursday
Chipotle
The character: Chipotle Mexican Grill, a fast food chain with a questionable food safety record.
The plot: On Thursday night, Chipotle ran an epic two-and-a-half minute mawkish advertisement during the Cowboys-Raiders game that featured a cartoon farmer seemingly freezing to death in the snow and his son picking up the mantle of the family farm.
The repercussion: The Chipotle ad got ripped apart by football fans who were flabbergasted that the excessively long commercial was actually a promotion for the fast food chain.
The feedback was so overwhelming that a Twitter Trending Topics curation editor actually had to explain that the ad left the nation "emotional and confused."
Read the previous edition of our One Main Character column, which includes a conservative conference declaring war on Sesame Street and more.
Did we miss a main character from this week? Please send tips to [email protected].
