Ugliness As Internet Shock Value

Sabrina Prater and the Goddess Bunny

Have you seen this video—or some variation of it—on your TikTok For You Page (FYP)?

They’re pretty generic dancing videos made by Sabrina Prater, who, by the looks of it, is a crossdresser squatting in an abandoned home with his dogs.

Or more generously, maybe he’s renovating a home that’s in disrepair, and in his down time, makes TikTok videos.

It’s unclear what exactly is going on, we just know so little.

We know about his squalid surroundings. We know that he identifies as a man. We know that he has a computer that some have speculated reveal that he’s “holding people hostage” Silence of the Lambs-style, but to me, close inspection only reveals that he’s filming himself from multiple angles.

Maybe he cams, maybe he streams his dancing to other sites.

But conspiracy videos are starting to pop up about him. People are starting to create lore.

TikTok Weirdness

TikTok reminds me of the early Internet, partially because of something I mentioned a few posts ago: it’s teeming with weird people.

What do I mean by weird? I mean people who are genuinely at the margins of society.

Kenneth Lee Anderson, a self-proclaimed disabled amputee and virgin, has amassed small fandom on TikTok. As an aside, there also seems to be some… unusual drama afoot there. More on that when I figure out what exactly is going on.

Not people who pick up the label marginalized and use it as some kind of certification that they’re authentic, but by all accounts lead very normal, normative lifestyles. I mean the kind of people who you might see at the grocery store every now and then, who you can’t help but be a little afraid of, or whom you might jeer at with your friends.

The kind of people who end up as ephemeral ghosts, known only to you and those in your life as bit players in mean-spirited Snapchats.