If M&Ms turn you on, you might have a problem | Opinion

When I saw that the terms “Tucker Carlson” and “M&Ms” were trending on social media, I thought that these should be two very entertaining stories worth checking out. Wrong.

It was ONE story — yes, about Tucker Carlson and M&Ms.

Apparently, this has been a controversy for a while. However, as an admittedly unhip and out-of-the-loop guy, I didn’t know that M&Ms had become the worst abomination in America since Mickey Mouse.

Granted, it’s been years since I’ve paid attention to Tucker, probably not since his Pee-Wee Herman bow-tie phase and long before he became known for his scrunched-up eyebrows of perpetual disgust and/or confusion. And it’s been years since I’ve indulged in M&Ms. They’re not exactly on my diet plan.

I’ll admit, though, that I’ve consumed an M&M or two in my day. It’s pretty hard to beat that hard candy shell enveloping delicious milk chocolate. Unfortunately, the bags of M&Ms were just way too small unless you got a family size bag. Granted, I’ve got a family size stomach, but I’m working on that.

I once worked on the newspaper’s copy desk with someone who loved M&Ms and ate a small bag almost every night. She had a few quirks, and one was that she would separate the M&Ms by color and then eat one color at a time even though they actually taste the same. As an Auburn fan, she kept the orange and blue ones far from the red ones that she associated with Alabama, which she’d eat last each time.

One night, we bought a few bags of M&Ms and while she was at dinner, we opened her bag and filled it completely with red M&Ms before gluing it back together. I’ve never heard a decent Christian woman utter quite so many unholy terms in one breath. We just kept on typing and feigning ignorance. (Of all the things I can feign, ignorance is right there at the top of the list.)

But there’s one thing I never noticed about M&Ms back then — their shoes. I didn’t even know they had legs. However, the cartoon M&Ms that have graced ads and commercials in recent years apparently had legs and shoes. When they first started out, some were decidedly guys, while others were quite feminine. I didn’t notice, but Tucker Carlson did. And he got very disappointed that the girl M&Ms began to dial back their milk-chocolatey sexiness by going to sneakers and comfortable shoes instead of go-go boots and heels.

“M&Ms will not be satisfied until every last cartoon character is deeply unappealing and totally androgynous,” he said, and that when “you’re totally turned off, we’ve achieved equity.”

This led to yet another crusade by the anti-cancel culture crusader to cancel something. Apparently, the only time folks really hate cancel culture is when they’re not the ones doing the canceling. Just ask the Dixie Chicks. And, sure enough, Tucker got the M&M characters canceled. They’ve been replaced by that ultra-conservative Maya Rudolph.

No one, meanwhile, has commented on the most disturbing part of this whole story. When Tucker complained that he was getting “turned off” as the girl M&Ms got less girly, he was admitting that he was pretty turned on before the footwear changes.

I’m not judging. I’ve considered buying Little Debbie a drink myself. But I’ve found that if I begin getting upset about the way candy, cartoons or Maya Rudolph dresses, it’s probably me, not Little Debbie, who needs to have a drink and chill out.

Connect with Chris Johnson at KudzuKid.com.

This story was originally published January 31, 2023 at 5:00 AM.