A Dick Anniversary
Remembering Big Dick Energy before the hammer came down
Dear Squawkers,
It is absurd, I know, to bother acknowledging any anniversary having to do with dicks. Every day in the history of humankind has been Dick Day, how could we possibly narrow it down to one day when dicks win all the days of the week? It’s entirely unnecessary. There is, however, an anniversary coming up that I’ve been thinking about that has less to do with dicks, actually, and more to do with pop culture and perception. And it’s happening at an interesting time, but I’m still trying to untangle what it means, if anything. So this is not about dicks, but about an expression that has a dick in it (no pun intended), although a dick isn’t required to achieve it:
Big Dick Energy
Remember the year everyone was using Big Dick Energy, or BDE, in a sentence? The anniversary of Big Dick Energy entering the pop culture lexicon is June 8. This year, BDE turns eight years old.
Big Dick Energy, the expression, was introduced to us on Twitter, when it was legitimately still called Twitter, by Kyrell Grant, a Toronto-based writer who is under-credited for her contribution because, as is often the case, Black women give us so much good and never get anything back. Which, by the way, Kyrell has written about basically the entire internet creating content based on a phrase she invented, and profiting, and how she gained fuckall for her creativity. Kyrell is on Twitter @imbobswaget, on Instagram @imbobswaget and here on Substack @imbobswaget.
Kyrell was referring to Anthony Bourdain on that day in June 2018, when news broke that he had died.
Two weeks later, Ariana Grande responded on Twitter (since deleted) to a comment about how long “pete” is, meaning the song. And she posted, “like 10 inches?…oh fuck…I mean…like a lil over a minute”.
From there, another Twitter user then used Big Dick Energy to describe Pete Davidson, to whom Ariana had just gotten engaged. And the whole thing exploded. Everyone was talking about BDE. And everyone came up with their own definition for it and who did or didn’t have it…
