the jolliest banana bender
hello czarkness, my old friend
I have watched this video 3 times now and I am not ashamed. twitter.com/filler/status/…
— filler (@filler) filler
I cannot stop watching this video. I don't know what's happening to me.
— Pete Cheslock (@petecheslock) petecheslock
OK fine. I watched it four times. Fine.
— claco (@claco) claco
This is the best thing I have seen all year and I have seen a lot of things this year.
— vmtyler (@vmtyler) vmtyler
@petechesbot gets his revenge: petecheslock
The most of thanks to @notnownikki for the best video filler's cried to this year!
Simon and Czarfunkel, Explained to No One
Paul Czarkowski — @pczarkowski on the internet, the czar — is Australian. Queensland, specifically, which makes him a banana bender in the classic Australian state-based insult tradition. The "czar" handle was not chosen to invite the Simon and Garfunkel pun, but once someone made it, it could not be unmade.
"Hello Czarkness My Old Friend" arrived fully formed, the way the best ops-community puns do: exactly enough context required, no explanation needed once you have that context. If you know who the czar is, the pun lands immediately and completely. If you don't, the pun means nothing and the explanation doesn't help. This is the correct behavior for an in-joke.
The video is whatever the video is. The important thing is that @filler watched it, then @petecheslock, then @claco, then @vmtyler, each one logging their viewcount in public like a confession. The Twitter thread of people admitting they cannot stop watching something is a specific genre of ops community cultural artifact. The thing doesn't have to be explicable. It just has to be real.
Why This Happened
The ops community in a certain era of Twitter was a genuinely small place. The same hundred or so people kept appearing in each other's timelines, which meant that when one of them found something good and posted it, the rest would see it within minutes. The thread of repeat viewings is not a coincidence — it's a small room where everyone can hear each other laugh.
@notnownikki made the video. She gets credit, as she should. The rest of them just kept watching it, which is the sincerest form of acknowledgment the internet offers.
Hello czarkness, my old friend. I've come to page with you again.— the ops community, collectively, at 2:47am
