Banner art by あか。
Doom scrolling through socials in 2024 feels like wandering through a mixed-up, meme-filled funfair. Whether you’re on Lens, Twitter, Instagram, or TikTok, you’ll run into content designed to both embarrass and entertain at the same time. Yep, you just came across some shitposting. At its core, this practice is about sharing offbeat pics and captions that disrupt the polished narratives we've gotten used to. It's a web-based guerrilla move against the hyper-perfect content that’s taken over our feeds. And instead of fading into the background, shitposting has blown up, becoming a key part of today’s online culture.
Born from subversive forums like OG 4chan and its Japanese counterpart, 2chan, where trolling and disrupting conversations was the standard, shitposting has now bled into all socials. Shizoposts, nonsensical memes, and cryptic inside jokes flood timelines as trolls, normies, and everyone in between revel in this weird playground we live in. What began as an attempt to destabilize standard online discourse has grown into a phenomenon that contaminates the whole network. Can be butter-maxxing posts, sloppy masterpieces poking fun at Tezos artists, spicy jokes about the crypto market and politics, fries & McDonald's glorifying ✞, or even obscure references tied to net subcultures and ACC cults 𓃵 —it’s just all over the place.
But what’s feeding this obsession with absurdity? And why does the internet seem to love it so much?
An Internet Ph3nomenon
Shitposting, or trashposting, has evolved from a fringe activity into one of the defining features of social media today. It reflects a collective desire to wreck the tightly selected, polished content that floods most platforms; staged Insta posts, sleek YouTube vlogs, and carefully crafted Twitter threads. That sucks, right? Instead, we crave something real, dirty, and raw. Something unfiltered, and unplanned, and shitposting do the job here. A seemingly pointless post adds spontaneity to an otherwise structured, algorithm-driven space. It’s a refreshing hit of whatever, with no expectation of deep thought or engagement.
Entertainment only? Not. It’s also a form of ‘riot’ for the netizens and an opportunity to break free from the dominant narratives that social media perpetuate. Havin' fun on the internet through shitposting becomes a form of social commentary. It uses humor as both a weapon and a shield, letting users address topics in a manner that feels lighthearted yet still impactful. When a shitpost about capitalism pops up on your screen, for example, forget about the joke; it’s more about the subtle critique of the systems that platforms thrive on. Pushing back against highly curated norms creates environments for a different kind of convo—one that doesn’t care. One that doesn’t take itself too seriously.
In Web3, especially, it has become its kind of expression. Some communities build around content that feels impenetrable to mainstream audiences. In these groups, it’s fully accepted and represents a duty. It’s how people bond and set themselves apart from the glossy, corporate feel of Web2. Sharing low-effort posts is central to this culture, where irreverence rules, and there’s no room for the usual. Be it mocking market crashes or riffing on internet trends, degens turn this game into an insider language, leaving outsiders on the bench.
Algorithmic Hack
One reason this controversial practice has become so widespread is its ability to manipulate algorithms. Web2 socials are built to prioritize engagement above all else; the more likes, comments, and shares a post receives, the higher its visibility. Shitposting, because of its unpredictability, often provokes strong reactions—laughter, confusion, or even outrage. These responses drive activity, triggering the algorithm to spread the post even further. In many ways, posting 'shit' is the perfect viral material; shareable, while its irreverence can start debates.
However, this success creates tension between active shitposters and the platforms themselves. While these companies want to encourage engagement, they also want to maintain control over what goes viral. Shitposting confronts the idea of quality that is supposed to be promoted. Yet, at the same time, platforms can’t deny that this practice boosts their metrics—a dilemma that leaves them in a love-hate relationship with the phenomenon. They want to contain the anarchy, but the more they try, the more the situation slips through the cracks.
Social Critique, Brat, and Pocket Hippo
Beyond its playful value, shitposting often serves as a form of social and political commentary. In an era where influencer culture is #1, it offers a way to resist the stiffness of online personas. Here, we poke fun at everything reflecting today’s society. Elon Musk’s frequent tweets, for instance, bring together serious communication with trolling. Whether he’s posting Milady's 'There is no Meme, ILY' classic, Tesla's bizarre ads, election madness, brat, and Moo Deng memes, Musk has embraced this act to stay relevant.
This amalgam of humor and commentary is evident with Moo Deng, the pygmy hippo who recently turned into a meme sensation after Khao Kheow Open Zoo shared her antics online. What started as basic posts quickly snowballed into a net-bomb, with fans creating everything from crazy fan art to cakes and merch. Moo Deng’s cuteness catched the internet, even landing her a parody on NBC's Saturday Night Live. However, the hype also brought chaos, as visitors got too rowdy, prompting the zoo to step in. This is a proof that shitposting can rally support, ignite debates, and make even a pocket hippo a viral star.
Is Shitposting an art? (ofc it is.)
It may seem jumbled up, but it shares similarities with historical avant-garde movements like Dadaism. Emerging in the early 20th century as a backlash to WWI, this style rejects conventional norms and adopts the beauty of the useless and sometimes the ugly. Artists in that movement used intended absurdity to challenge the definition of art—and shitposting does the same for web stuff. Broken visuals and cheap jokes prevail here. They question what 'good' should look like and teasing the rigidity of social media.
But is it truly art, or just trash? This notion plays in the zone between meaning and nonsense. Its very pointlessness is what makes it powerful—it resists the demand for coherent content and celebrates randomness. No matter if it’s a new frontier for creativity or simply digital clutter, it has undeniably changed how we think about what we see on our screens.
So, what’s next for this practice?
Because AI-generated material becomes more sophisticated, we might see the separation between shitposting and more regular content completely disappear. Yup. The blast is likely to keep evolving, especially as decentralization offers new spaces for these performances to flourish.
Looking at it as either a genuine web-based performative art form or simply a mess, one thing is clear: it’s here to stay, and it’s reshaping how we interact online. The question remains—will we welcome this new process in content creation, or will we defy the noise? Either way, it’s a new dialect on the internet, and the entire connected world has a chance to participate.
Let’s post good shit together. ٩(ˊᗜˋ*)و ♡
b.
