The world of Twitter can be hard to navigate. We know that you’re already following us @flavorpill, but we decided it would be fun (and possibly helpful) if we rounded up some of our other Twitter favorites in a series we call “The Followables.” In this installment, we realize that a Twitter account is very much like all good things in life — it’s what you do with it that counts. When Slate dissected at length the twin faux-Twitter accounts Wise and Kranky Kaplan, it got us thinking: What other Twitter feeds do we know and love utilize the forum as a platform for some form of performance art, creating a character in 140 characters? Be warned, some are NSFW. Add your performance-art Twitter suggestions in the comments.
Who: High Fructose Corn Syrup
Why: HiFrucCornSyrup appeared at the height of 2009’s hysteria over the artificial sweetener as a tongue-in-cheek champion of the stuff, an anthropomorphized man-made chemical with a sense of humor.
Who: Fake Robert Pattison
Why: A fake, take-no-prisoners version of Twilight film franchise star Robert Pattison only serves to echo what we know he’s really thinking.
Who: Lil’ Andrew WK
Why: Lil’ Andrew WK is the perfect pint-sized version of big Andrew WK… right down to his love of all things that bring the party.
Who: Feminist Hulk
Why: The day we discovered Feminist Hulk on Twitter our lives became a little bit better. Marrying Bruce Banner’s hyper-aggro gruntspeak to a wily feminist wit, Feminist Hulk is especially exciting when acts of misogyny get him/her (we’re not sure which) riled up enough to smash.
Who: Drunk Stepfather
Why: Drunk Stepfather, the greasy Twitter account of the Drunken Stepfather blog, could just as well be called “horny younger brother,” though the “stepfather” implication only adds to the creepiness factor. Count on Drunk Stepfather to engage with every one of your taboos regarding the age of consent, acceptable sexual acts, substance abuse, and language… all within one single tweet. It’s especially fun to cross-reference Drunk Stepfather with Lindsay Lohan whenever the latter tweets, because he hops on her like a three year old on birthday cake.
Who: Ruth Bourdain
Why: Whoever came up with the brilliant idea to dedicate time every day to tweeting in the voice of a hybrid of bad-boy chef Anthony Bourdain and foodie journo Ruth Reichl, we salute you.
Who: Fake Metropolitan Transit Authority
Why: Yes, we’ve said it before: New York really is the center of the universe. That said, we’re fairly sure that public transit being an abject failure is a universal experience, and that’s why all can share in the joy of the Fake MTA Twitter account, which publicly and slyly nods to the Metropolitan Transit Authority (and every transit authority, really) in its inability to simply get us where we need to go, when we need to get there.
Who: Big Ben
Why: Sometimes the best ideas are the simplest: Every hour, on the hour, you can count on a string of cacophonous chimes from the Twitter account of London’s Big Ben.
Who: A Hot Amish Chick
Why: If one of the Hills girls was attempting the chaste, butter-churning life, we imagine it would sound a little something like this.
Who: BP Global PR
Why: In the wake of the recent oil spill crises, the faux BP Global PR account served to illustrate the best use of Twitter as a medium for performance: holding up a mirror to horrific current events. Its hilarious and lacerating tweets caused such a ruckus around the internet that BP lobbied to have Twitter shut them down. Fortunately for our dark sense of humor, they’re still alive and snarking.