Background
On June 6th, 2013, Canadian comedian Nathan Fielder[1], whose previous Twitter experiment “2 Grams For $40” went viral in April, instructed his Twitter followers to text their parents asking them if it is illegal to not tell a sexual partner that they may have given them a sexually transmitted disease and specify that they were asking for a “friend.” In less than 24 hours, this instructional tweet was retweeted nearly 1,900 times and favorited more than 900 times.
Experiment: text your parents “If you think u gave someone an STD is it illegal not to tell them? Asking for a friend.” Then tweet response.
— nathan fielder (@nathanfielder) June 6, 2013
Fielder’s Twitter Experiments
Fielder has hosted a number of similar pranks on parents via Twitter in 2013. His first idea[13], tweeted on April 13th, 2013, instructed his followers to simply e-mail the word “help” to their parents, followed by another proposal,[14] tweeted on April 20th, asking people to message their fathers inquiring about the quality of condoms purchased at a dollar store. A week prior to his STD prank, Fielder encouraged people to text their significant other the phrase “I havent been fully honest with you.” The texter was not allowed to respond for an hour.[10] His instructional tweet received more than 4,600 retweets and 2,500 favorites, yielding dozens of examples (shown below).
Notable Developments
Five minutes after Fielder’s initial tweet, follower Brandy Haynes was the first person to complete the task. She shared a screenshot of a text message conversation with her Mom who responded by saying that it better not have really been her with the issue. Within hours, Fielder had retweeted 16 screenshot responses.
<a href="https://twitter.com/nathanfielder">nathanfielder</a> <a href="http://t.co/6tLuKPqvsh" title="http://twitter.com/Haynes03/status/342763293380857856/photo/1">twitter.com/Haynes03/statu…</a></p>— Brandy Haynes (Haynes03) June 6, 2013
Blog Coverage
On June 6th, a number of websites immediately documented the prank including comedy blog Splitsider[2], men’s humor website Bro Bible[3], Laughing Squid[4] and the Huffington Post Canada.[5] The following morning, additional coverage was found on Gawker[6], The FW[7], The Daily Dot[8] and Uproxx.[9]
Notable Responses
Search Interest
External References
[1]Twitter – @nathanfielder
[2]Splitsider – Nathan Fielder Has a New Twitter Experiment About Parents and STD’s
[3]Bro Bible – Nathan Fielder’s Latest Diabolical Twitter Prank Involves Texting Parents About STDs.
[4]Laughing Squid – Nathan Fielder Has Followers Text Their Parents Asking About the Legality of Giving Someone a Sexually Transmitted Disease
[5]The Huffington Post Canada – Nathan Fielder’s ‘Is It Illegal’ Text Prank Is Disastrously Funny (PHOTOS)
[6]Gawker – Comedian Gets Kids to Play Evil ‘STD Prank’ on Their Parents>a?
[7]The FW – Comedian Nathan Fielder Gets Teens to Play STD Prank on Parents
[8]The Daily Dot – Comedian’s latest prank makes parents believe their kids are spreading STDs
[9]Uproxx – Nathan Fielder’s Newest Twitter Prank Makes Parents Think Their Kids Have STDs
[10]Laughing Squid – Nathan Fielder Has People Text ‘I Haven’t Been Fully Honest With You’ to the Person They Are Dating & Then Not Respond