Three insane stories of niche Internet Drama

BookTok sexually harasses NHL player, Quiz Show hero fakes death, and *MISTER SQUIGGLE'S REVENGE*

Every once in a while, I run across a great story from social media that doesn’t really fit into a typical post. These are incredibly funny and fascinating stories, but maybe just timed poorly with other planned posts, or they’re a bit raunchy, or they just get passed by some time-sensitive breaking news.

I’ve kept three of those stories in my back pocket, and I’m documenting them now as a bonus for paid subs. If you’re not a paid sub, consider joining and helping to support the blog! If you are a paid sub then buckle up, because wooooo boy these get real weird, real fast.

BookTok sexually harasses a hockey player then goes after his wife

So, there’s this thing called BookTok. You can probably imagine what it is - an informal name for the community of people discussing books on TikTok. But BookTok is not just a place for people to discuss books. Oh no, my friend. It’s so much more.

BookTok also participates in the wider phenomenon of fanfiction and ‘shipping’. For those of you blessed to not know what those words are, some quick definitions. Fanfiction is what is says on the label - fictional stories written by fans of a franchise or celebrity. Shipping is when you enjoy writing about or discussing two characters having a romantic relationship.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. “What the hell does any of this have to do with hockey?” Don’t worry, we’re getting there.

There is a section of BookTok and the shipping universe known as RL shipping. These are people who don’t write fanfiction about Harry Potter or Star Wars, but rather about real life celebrities. They may also ‘ship’ certain RL people and write stories about them being romantically entangled. One very popular niche here is hockey fanfiction shippers, who do this with professional hockey players.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. “BookTok. Shipping. Fanfiction. Jeremiah, none of these words are in the Bible.” Trust me, these people will never see heaven.

So, BookTok’s niche section of hockey RL shippers had had a favorite - Alex Wennberg. They loooooooooooved Alex Wennberg. He was a frequent character in some of these fanfictions, and that spilled over into social media love. He, without ever asking for this or maybe even being aware of it at first, developed a small stan army consisting of people who knew absolutely nothing about hockey but thought he was super hot.

Eventually his team (the Seattle Kraken) noticed that they were getting a lot of attention and decided to run with it. I don’t blame them! Hockey is a declining sport, and needs any publicity it can get. The Kraken began engaging with BookTokers on social media. They started putting Wennberg in more and more social media posts, since they noticed those ones got huge response. They even invited one of the most prominent members of BookTok to a game!

This is absolutely not a sign of terrible things to come

What could possibly go wrong?