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Elmo, We’re Not Doing Alright. But at Least We Can Joke About It!

Posted on by bkatarz

At 10:46 am on January 29th the official Elmo X account made a post saying, “Elmo is just checking in! How is everybody doing?” 

It was an innocent inquiry from arguably the most iconic character from Sesame Street that was likely conceived to play to audiences’ nostalgia in a similar vein as the post from Steve from Blue’s Clues did a few years back, but the responses were not the same.

The one singular post from Elmo received over 131 million views, 77 thousand likes, 31 thousand quotes, 6 thousand reposts, and 10 thousand bookmarks. This post blew up. Looking deeper at the analytics, since Elmo asked the users of X how they were doing “Elmo” was mentioned across X over 300 thousand times, and these posts reach almost 2 billion users. The sentiments of the discussion around Elmo are almost exactly 25% positive to 75% negative. The top themes of the discussion include terms such as “Great Elmo,” “Good,” “Bad,” and “F**king limit.” This leaves one to wonder what exactly users were saying to or about Elmo. Many users took to quoting the original post to “tell Elmo” how they were doing.

While some were doing what has been referred to as “trauma dumping,” which the Cambridge Dictionary defines as “the act of telling another person or other people in a detailed way about problems and emotional pain that you have experienced, expecting them to give you sympathy and comfort, when they may not be able or willing to do this,” others took the opportunity to hope onto a viral joke. 

https://twitter.com/sleep2dream/status/1752047357439434817?s=46&t=3LXPh2VbZ7i1qhDmF-cxwQ

One hashtag that began circulating along with the Elmo discourse was #emotionalwellbeing which was popularized by a follow up post from the Elmo account posted on the afternoon of the 30th. The account wrote, “Wow! Elmo is glad he asked! Elmo learned that it is important to ask a friend how they are doing. Elmo will check in again soon, friends!  Elmo loves you.❤️ #EmotionalWellBeing.” 

Further, the official Sesame Street X account quoted this post providing some mental health resources saying, “Mental health is health! For #EmotionalWellBeing resources and more, visit @SesameWorkshop: Sesame.org/MentalHealth.”

It is also important to note that while this discourse has been taking place with users from around the world, it was primarily centered with users from the United States with over 130 thousand mentions of Elmo here alone. Some famous individuals and accounts also hopped into the discussion such as United States president Joe Biden, the government organization NASA, and singer-songwriter T-Pain.

In the end, all jokes aside, it is important to remember that mental health is an important part of our wellbeing. If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, consider the following resources:

Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s free 24-hour helpline: 1-800-662-HELP (4357)

Mental Health America’s website

Mental Health First Aid’s website

Author: Ben Katarzynski

Posted in Tracking News via Social Media Analytics