7 Most Controversial Recurring Black Twitter Debates, Ranked

7. Drums or flats?

The differing chicken wing factions have been at war for internet centuries (i.e., a decade or so). The flats family and drums family have had such a bitter rivalry that one day a drum and a flat fell in love and were so stressed that a drum faked its death and a flat drank poison to join it in eternal chicken afterlife. This is serious business. People have fought over which is better. Only Swizz and Timbo can settle this delicious debate. (The answer is flats.)

6. Color quizzes

No, this isn’t about Rachel Dolezal or the college professor lady without any lips who pretended to be Black. This is about someone posting a photo of a shoe or a dress or some other random object and asking Twitterers to guess what color it is, knowing no consensus will be met. It’s always a mindfuck that makes our heads hurt.

5. Sex talk

On the rare occasion, Black Twitter likes to indulge in discussions about sex. The chatter revolves around all sorts of topics, like analingus, what does finishing look like, and what constitutes the end of a “round.” We’d just like everyone to remember one important thing: Jesus is watching.

4. The Future/Ciara/Russell Wilson relationship

Every time Russell Wilson and/or Ciara do anything in public that is remotely related to their family, Future Hive is activated, and it spills out into a public discourse that is really just one big proxy argument for our own issues over blended families. When one of these gets going, you might as well just log off for the day.

3. HBCUs vs. PWIs

This age-old debate goes back to the days of W.E.B. Dubois tweeting to Booker T. Washington to meet him in Temecula. Every time something trash happens at a PWI, there’s always someone who mentions how it wouldn’t have happened at an HBCU and we get into a big ol’ fight where no one benefits. Twitter is tearing our families apart!

2. Dinner with Jay-Z?

Jay-Z is one of the most business-savvy legends we have — imagine how much knowledge he could bestow on you in any given moment. Now imagine a 30-minute dinner with him. Think about the gems he’d drop. How much is that worth? Well, one famous internet hypothetical asks if you’d rather break bread with Jigga or pocket $50,000 — a favorite for would-be entrepreneurs to drop fake-deep takes. It’s a silly premise, and yet every year, right around the Roc Nation brunch during Grammy weekend, someone fires it back into the Twitterverse. Check, please.

1. $200 dates

Thankfully, this debate has died down as of late — mostly due to the fact that we’re all broke and have a hard enough time even finding a restaurant where socially distant outdoor seating is possible. But there’s always some sort of argument about what constitutes the cost of a date. Just last week, someone fixed their Twitter fingers to tell followers not to even go on a date if you don’t have $1,000. Oh.