Hot Vax and/or White Boy Summer has come and gone, which means Small Penis Fall is now upon us.
Yes, it’s Small Penis Fall, or so hath declared comedian and Small Penis Fall founder Megan Bitchell, who announced the start of the season in a September 1 tweet that has amassed more than 25,000 likes. Small Penis Fall has since spent the month creeping towards internet virality, inspiring suggested seasonal holidays like “Little Peen Halloween” and spawning the Small Penis Fall Ice Bucket Challenge, which aims not only to “show support for the small penis community, but to give those with a larger penis the chance to show solidarity by shrinking their dicks with freezing cold water.” Clearly, Small Penis Fall is in the air, but, uh, what the hell is it?
First of all, it’s a joke. Not unlike other trending internet seasons including Christian Girl Autumn, Simptember and Chet Hanks’s controversial White Boy Summer, Small Penis Fall is yet another satirical Hot Girl Summer spinoff to join the internet’s ever-growing calendar of meme seasons.
“I was like, ‘Oh, white boy, summer’s over. We need a new season,’” Bitchell tells InsideHook. “‘Hot Girl Blank’ is played out at this point, so I was just like, ‘I guess it’s Small Penis Fall.’”
But while Small Penis Fall is largely rooted in satire, it’s important to note that it’s not a joke at anyone’s expense, least of all small penis havers. In fact, Bitchell herself says she tends to prefer a penis on the smaller side, and figured creating an internet season in their honor might be “a good way to reel them in.”
“All of the men I’ve dated in the past have had small dicks, so it’s my type,” says Bitchell. “So I was playing 4D Chess to try to get men to message me.”
If you build it, they will come, and Bitchell has since welcomed a deluge of messages from small penis havers into her DMs — including, unfortunately if inevitably, a number of unsolicited small dick pics. “I should have been more prepared for the dick pictures,” she admits, adding that one person even sent her a veritable dick pic triptych inspired by the Small Penis Fall Ice Bucket Challenge.
“A guy sent me a series of three photos. The first one was a little bucket of ice. The second one was his penis in the bucket of ice. And then the third one was just his very small penis,” says Bitchell, adding that while she’s willing to recognize the “brilliant visual storytelling” at play, unsolicited small dick pics are still a Small Penis Fall violation, and offenders will be blocked.
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But Small Penis Fall is about more than Bitchell’s personal horny agenda. While she’s reluctant to mine her own joke for serious subtext, there is a level of sincerity to the call for small penis representation that Small Penis Fall issues. Like many who have become disenchanted with various aspects of the body positivity movement in recent years, Bitchell has noticed a lack of representation for men and the unrealistic societal beauty standards they face, as well as the reductive theses to which the body positive ideology is often boiled down.
“I have problems with the body positivity movement, because it’s still like, ‘Oh, well don’t worry, men still find you fuckable if you’re fat’ or whatever,” says Bitchell. “It feels like I’m being a pick me girl, but literally, the men that I like to date are short, fat, small dick guys. I don’t know why, just all of them are that. So I thought it would kind of be funny to turn this female body positivity around and be like, ‘Don’t worry, quote ‘gross’ men, you’re still fuckable.’”
Most seem to have embraced the spirit of Small Penis Fall’s cheeky and vaguely subversive call for small penis solidarity, though there has of course been the inevitable handful of men who have taken it upon themselves to announce that Small Penis Fall is definitely not for them, wink, wink.
“Those are the most annoying replies. I hate those,” says Bitchell.
Then of course there are those who miss the irony entirely, and have mistaken Small Penis Fall for a joke at the expense of small penis-havers, while others have taken offense at Bitchell’s Ice Bucket Challenge appropriation. “I was really shocked that there were at least five quote retweets that were like, ‘This is disrespectful. My father died of ALS,’” says Bitchell. “And I was like, ‘No. I’m just dumping ice water on my head. I’m not trying to be disrespectful. It’s just the ice bucket challenge, making a joke about it does not mean I hate people with ALS.”
Still, the Small Penis Fall founder is well aware that some backlash is always to be expected when it comes to the business of making jokes on the internet. “That’s always the risk with a viral tweet, that it leaves your bubble,” she says. “I think the only people that have been either offended or angry are the ones that don’t already know that I’m being ironic.”
Otherwise, she adds, “It seems like everybody’s in on the joke this time” and embracing Small Penis Fall for what it is: a lighthearted, tongue-in-cheek celebration of small penises in which everyone is invited to partake.
“I don’t regret making the joke. I think it’s been way more fun than it has anything else,” says Bitchell, adding that watching the internet’s more or less collective embrace of the Small Penis Fall silliness can actually be “very wholesome sometimes.”
While Bitchell’s inaugural Small Penis Fall tweet declared the only rule of Small Penis Fall is that “you have to have a small penis,” Small Penis Fall is clearly a celebration for everyone, regardless of penis size. If anything, it seems the only rule of Small Penis Fall is that there are no rules, except maybe don’t send unsolicited photos of your small penis, and don’t take it too seriously.
As for the future of Small Penis Fall? “I get a small dick husband that I love and cherish. That’s the first goal,” says Bitchell. “The second goal is it just keeps getting funnier. I think it would be funny if it snowballed out of control. I just think it’s so funny that on the internet you can just put something out there and then whatever happens, happens. It’s remarkable.”
If the Small Penis Fall founder has one regret, “It’s that I didn’t say ‘Small Penis Autumn.’ Fall sounds a little bit clunkier.” Still, she adds, “I’m happy either way. I’m just happy that people are having fun with it.”
And that, friends, is the true meaning of Small Penis Fall.
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