16. The Racist Taco Truck Girl
As Rippa feared, the internet exploded. The video went so viral that even mainstream media was talking about it.
Rippa’s family let out a sigh of relief to see that in the vast majority of clips circulating, Rippa was barely visible. The only time she was in focus was the part where she picked up Buttons and ran away. Mom and Dad patted Rippa’s back for having had the presence of mind to wear a mask and a beanie.
All focus was on Buttons. It didn’t help that Elon Musk himself shared a clip on X, with a simple caption, “FAFO.” That poured fuel on the fire. Anyone who hated Musk now hated Buttons, too. Musk’s fans, on the other hand, fiercely defended Buttons’ actions.
Half the internet was convinced Buttons was a white supremacist. Clips of her uttering “I’ll judge you badly,” and “How uncivilized,” went around with over-the-top analysis of how racist this little kid was, which then often ended with the conclusion that Buttons deserved to die.
Ironically, the other side used the same clips but taunted that they had been judging people by the “content of their character” all along. Some argued that “we can’t have a civil society with these people.”
AI-generated images started popping up. Rippa cringed at seeing an image of Buttons wielding her cane, standing bravely next to the Scottish Axe Girl. But to be honest, Rippa found it hilarious that people photoshopped Miss Pendrake’s face onto Saber.
Mom had to deal with local moms. They remembered Buttons from the playground and very politely asked in the group chat if the ‘relative’s kids’ were planning to visit again anytime soon.
“I have a cousin who lives near that area. He said gangs are looking for the girl,” Letitia warned Mom in private.
“Look, if we don’t keep our mouths shut, thugs will come looking for the kid. Surely we don’t want them in our neighborhood, especially when they plan to hurt a child?” Mom argued, to which Letitia agreed.
Rippa hadn’t even known the neighboring town had gangs, but now her paranoia went up a notch.
And then… the autistic 4chan detectives went and did it. Rippa herself had been a 4chan kid and had no objection to the site. She had always been aware that a significant portion of her viewers were also on 4chan. But she had not expected that Buttons’ photo would be uploaded on /vt/, linking the now-infamous Racist Taco Truck Girl to the VTuber Rippin’ Rippa.
It was the photo Buttons herself had uploaded to Rippa’s Discord. Eyes, censored with a black bar, but still clearly Buttons. Only a handful of people had seen it, as it was immediately deleted by moderators. But of those few people, some had managed to save it. And then, one of them, who had been decent enough to just let it rot in their downloads folder, saw the viral Racist Taco Truck Girl clip and realized, ‘Wait, isn’t that—‘
And the motherfucker uploaded it on 4chan’s /vt/ board, side by side with a screenshot of Buttons’ face from the clip. “Yo, this based kid is Rippa’s friend.”
Another user then supported that claim by comparing a clip of Rippa yelling, “Buttons! Get off the internet!” during her stream against the same voice screaming “Buttons!” in the viral Racist Taco Truck Girl video.
X and Bluesky caught on immediately. The Racist Taco Truck Girl now had a name. Buttons. And by virtue of being Rippa’s friend, Buttons was now definitely confirmed as a white supremacist, transphobic, Nazi. Or based, depending on whom one asked.
Rippa was glad she hadn’t streamed since that day. Had she streamed as usual, as if nothing had happened, and then her chat found out she had been on the scene right there with Buttons but was acting like it didn’t happen… that would have gone down badly. Silence was a better option than lying.
Funny enough, the haters on Bluesky were 100% convinced Miss Pendrake was Rippa. “She’s white. She’s blond. That’s so KKK, and she’s flat. She must be Rippa,” was their logic. Strangely, 4chan’s /vt/ agreed with the theory, mostly because the idea that Rippa was actually pretty was an unexpected discovery they very much wished was real.
“No, people will very quickly realize they are wrong,” Dad dismissed it.
“Why? It makes sense?” Rippa demanded that Dad elaborate. She had thought the misidentification worked in her favor. Besides, Miss Pendrake would never face any real danger.
“When did you start VTubing?” Dad asked.
“Four years ago.”
“And how old does our Missy look?”
“Ah…”
Dad was now super worried. He argued that people would eventually realize Miss Pendrake was too young to be Rippa. They then would logically conclude the masked woman who took off with Buttons was the real Rippin’ Rippa. Sure, the whole shitshow happened in the next town, but that was too close for Dad’s comfort.
He and Mom had a discussion and paid a visit to Goggles. Buttons helped them by explaining to Goggles that there were many people who wanted Rippa dead. “She played the wizard game on stream,” Buttons added rather unnecessarily.
Mom and Dad returned shortly after and announced that Rippa would now be staying in Buttons’ palace until things settled down.
“But my stream—” Rippa protested, but that was immediately squashed by Goggles spawning an exact duplicate of Rippa’s streaming setup in his office. The PC even had the exact same software and their configurations, and even other personal files. Rippa had no other counterargument and thus packed her things and moved into her room in the palace.
To Rippa’s immense surprise, DeAndre stepped in. He made a lengthy X post detailing what had really happened. About how the girls had been racist and ableist against Buttons to begin with, and how they were the aggressors. He also told what had happened afterward. Cops came with ambulances and took statements from everyone. Apparently, the police weren’t so interested in pursuing the case, as it was a clear-cut act of self-defense by none other than a one-legged child. The girls were also not interested in pressing the matter, fearing they might face charges themselves for assaulting a disabled minor.
His post was met with accusations of him being an Uncle Tom, and DeAndre thereafter kept his mouth shut and stopped engaging.
‘Thanks, but it’s not your fight,’ Rippa thought. She was relieved to see DeAndre turtling up instead of fighting against the backlash. But at the same time, she was shocked and disgusted when she learned that DeAndre’s TikTok account was now banned. Violation of content guidelines, apparently.
***
Rippa sighed and put the phone down. Her X timeline was a shitshow, and her Discord was demanding that Rippa address the matter. She knew she couldn’t stay silent indefinitely. Rippa rubbed her temples and sank deep into the sofa.
Buttons was at the edge of Rippa’s peripheral vision. On the other side of the beach lounge, the kid sheepishly glanced at Rippa every few seconds.
Buttons had been very afraid to face Rippa for a while. She knew Rippa was mad, but didn’t know what to do, so instead she vaguely hoped Rippa would miraculously forget about being mad, and then everything would go back to being all sunny and happy.
Rippa sighed again. ‘Shit, I did exactly that when I made Mom mad.’
She cleared her throat. “Buttons, come here.”
The kid ran up to Rippa and sat across the coffee table, but then quickly realized she had done it rather too eagerly. Buttons fidgeted and looked down.
“You did nothing wrong,” Rippa declared. She felt a little pang when she saw the kid brighten up. “You defended yourself.”
“So you are not mad?”
Rippa held up her hand to shut Buttons up. “It’s who you did it to. That’s the problem.”
Buttons couldn’t resist an intrusive thought. “But it was just a dog!”
“Buttons!” Rippa then quickly calmed herself down. “That is not funny, and that is very, very inappropriate…” Rippa then paused. There was a good lesson here.
“Look, Buttons, if you know the full context of that quote, you would realize that makes you the villain of the movie.”
Buttons fidgeted again.
Rippa continued, “Context matters, Buttons, but the internet abhors context.” She allowed Buttons some time to digest that. “Do you know what they call you?”
Buttons looked up, at a loss.
“They are calling you the Racist Taco Truck Girl. They want you dead.”
“Huh?”
“Yeah.”
“Why? I’m not a racist,” Buttons objected to the very idea.
“Ah, you see, they want you to be a racist.”
“What?”
“Yeah.”