It feels strange talking about Clickhole in the form of a slideshow; it’s as though the Internet snake is eating itself. But then, that’s exactly what Clickhole, the Onion’s new Internet media satire site, is doing. Though every piece they’re churning out mocks the vapid empty landscape of puppies, photoshop fails, and thinkpieces, Clickhole has created a way for the Onion/A.V. Club intellectual snark machine to get in on the page view game. If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em … by mercilessly mocking them.
The early buzz around Clickhole was that the site would parody BuzzFeed. Those of us who have suffered through endless galleries of pug photos, endless lists about things only people who grew up some godforsaken place like Des Moines would know, and endless quizzes telling you just which Power Ranger you are, welcomed this satirical aim with open arms. Luckily for those of us who spend our days consumed by the Internet, the site has turned out to be just that, and so much more. Clickhole has taken aim at BuzzFeed, sure, but also the Salon-style thinkpiece, the new-agey celebrity gossip of TMZ, and the easy optimism of Upworthy videos. The site has even taken aim at the millennial advice columns that have helped me pay down my students loans for these last couple of years. In it’s short history, Clickhole has already become your sweet release from the unrelenting barrage of Internet bullshit.
It’s good to see a site like Clickhole jump into the fray. There is just so much material on the Internet ripe for the mocking. So far it seems that ClickHole, with its tone of merciless cynicism, is just the right site for the job. Let’s examine how Clickhole is going after the Internet’s biggest targets and why those targets richly deserve it as we take A Look Back At ClickHole’s First Month.