My all-time favorite clickbait headline, which has been around for years, just popped up again.
I note that I have never clicked on it. But the headline strikes me as so ludicrous that it never fails to raise a smile.
“Sketchy Things Everybody Just Ignores about Kaley Cuoco.”
Over a furtive-looking thumbnail of the actress’s face.
Just why this amuses me no end requires some parsing.
It may be randomness of the subject matter. Kaley Cuoco is a successful actress who lucked into a sitcom destined to run for years and years, and she’s been okay in a couple of other things including a thriller I once saw but can’t name about a kidnapped woman, but she’s an awfully off-center person to be the center of our moral indignation, even if she spends her free evenings flogging bats.
The word “Sketchy” helps too. It’s precisely modulated to imply revelations that HINT at awfulness, not the actual awfulness. Like, if she was observed every Thursday night loading her trunk with squirming parcels in black garbage bags.
And then there’s the outrage implied by “Just ignores.” Honestly, people! How can you drop the ball? Kaley Cuoco has this entire history of sketchy things! Why are you not organizing in protest? How can you go on watching her show, or not, while sweeping this tsunami of morally reprehensible scandal under the rug? THINK OF THE CHILDREN!
And all this over the thumbnail of Cuoco, perfectly chosen for its weary grimness, the way her character Penny would when Leonard does something particularly clueless. She knows she’s guilty! She can’t hide!
The combination of the phraseology, the urgency, and the thumbnail just gets past my filters, every time. I am taken aback every damn time. I almost want to click and find out just what dire sins she has in her past, but honestly, NOTHING CAN LIVE UP TO THAT HEADLINE.
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