When I woke up today, the first thing I saw on Twitter was people desperately warning that something gross was trending. Whatever you do, they agreed, do NOT click on trending topics, which appeared to mostly have to do with video games: Nintendo, Mario Kart, the beloved character Toad. I braced myself, figuring that, because of Twitter’s algorithm, whatever was grossing people out so much would soon be inserted into my timeline no matter what I or the people I follow did.

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