It’s Monday night. RuPaul’s Drag Race is airing the second episode of its eighth season, which is critically acclaimed by me, because I claim everything critically.
Side bar: Why don’t we use “disclaim” like we use “acclaim”? Or do we?
However, I don’t have a TV, and my “friends” with a “TV” are in “classes” or have “homework” so instead, we make a plan to watch RuPaul tomorrow, Tuesday, online.
Monday night, I’m already antsy. It’s officially past 10 p.m., so it’s officially past the airing of the episode, which means that all of my social media—Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, and Tumblr—are potentially flooded with spoilers (my social media accounts are extremely gay). So, like a monk, I take a vow of celibacy and instead read my book. every time I go to open the Twitter app—likely because there is a devil inside me—I flinch and avert my eyes, exiting the app before anything can be spoiled. I can’t scroll through Twitter. I can’t peruse Instagram. I can’t even watch YouTube in case I see any spoiler. It’s literally hell. I actually went on Tinder and started talking to boys because that was one place I was relatively certain I wouldn’t stumble upon a RPDR spoiler—unless, of course, you’re talking to a gay devil who loves spoiling TV shows.

Source: Reaction.Club
Side bar: I’m talking to a guy who knows a hot gay that I know, so he’s probably out of my league.
Tuesday, it’s almost 8 o’clock when I’m writing this, and I haven’t yet had anything spoiled. All I have is one more meeting, and then I’m going over to Marco and Mitchell’s and we can watch the episode and I can escape this circle of hell that not even f*cking Dante could cook up.
And during my twenty-four hours of self-induced celibacy—celebritacy?—I have learned something. The whole notion of “spoilers” is completely the trappings of a first-world 21st century millennial. Do you think our parents had to worry about spoilers? My parents had, like, ten channels and one house-phone. They didn’t have to worry about sh*t.
Even in the early ‘00s, when spoilers first started emerging, you didn’t have to worry in the same way. If you missed the last episode of Friends, all you had to do was avoid the water cooler at work. I’m not entirely sure, but I’m assuming the Internet wasn’t, like, a thing-thing in Friends’ hey-day. Now, if I want to avoid a TV spoiler, I have to avoid at least four people and six different social media, not to mention “recap” shows like The People’s Couch (wow, that’s my second mention of that show in as many posts).

Source: Fanpop via Huffington Post
I find it so fascinating that our generation can have such unique issues that no one else really had to deal with. Abstaining from social media to avoid spoilers is right up there next to having to change your Facebook profile picture but not having any solid choices, or trying to explain what a hashtag is to your mother while in a Panera Bread. We—the first-world millennials—are growing up in a unique bubble of child and adult.
The other day, I referred to the habit of watching television shows week-to-week, as opposed to binging on Netflix, as “the old way.” I have brainstorming sessions and poll focus groups before changing my social media handles—I’m now @dnnymccrthy on Instagram and Twitter if you want to follow me (dropping the a’s made it seem minimalist and Tumblr-y). I follow an Ina Garten parody account on Twitter. These are not things that have ever existed as problems before.

Source: Realitytvgifs.tumblr.com via Giphy
A more connected world is a blessing and a curse. It’s a blessing because I can be across the Atlantic and still be annoyed by my family. It’s a curse because there are, at any given point, at least two ugly photos of me from the seventh grade circulating the Internet. It’s, like, a Catch-22—jk I’m not old enough to get/make that reference.
We’re more educated, more opinionated, and more babied. That’s resulted in an entire generation of weird f*cking people. Today I discussed the rhetoric of Donald Trump on his campaign in class and Ubered from Trader Joe’s because it was raining. We’re giant babies.

Source: mouthymag.com via Washington Post
I’m okay with that though. Or, more truthfully, I’ll be okay with that if I can make it to tonight without some demon spoiling anything for me. Pray for me, guys.