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

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 Gov. Ron DeSantis went after Mickey Mouse upon realizing Donald Duck wasn’t wearing pants.

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 the diet plan my doctor proposed of air and water with the occasional saltine cracker on special occasions.

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 for a glutton 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. She ate a small bag almost every night to keep her going all the way to deadline. She had a few quirks, though, 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 who had played in the school’s marching band, she kept the orange and blue ones far from the red ones that she associated with hated rival Alabama. She’d only eat the row of red M&Ms at the very end, begrudgingly.

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, and there are many, 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. While I didn’t notice, Tucker Carlson sure 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. That may have been what permanently scrunched-up his eyebrows once and for all.

“M&Ms will not be satisfied until every last cartoon character is deeply unappealing and totally androgynous,” he warned, 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 yet again. Apparently, the only time folks really hate cancel culture is when they’re not the ones doing the canceling. 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 insinuated that he was getting “turned off” as the girl M&Ms got less girly, he was inversely admitting that he must have pretty turned on before the footwear changes.

I’m not judging. I’ve considered buying Little Debbie a drink myself. But, again, I had never noticed what shoes the M&Ms were wearing. I don’t even know if Donald Duck wears shoes, although I confess that I did notice he wasn’t wearing pants, which I find mildly disturbing. But I’ve found that if I begin getting upset about the way M&Ms, Donald Duck, Maya Rudolph or even Tucker Carlson dresses, it’s probably me and not Little Debbie who needs to have a drink and chill out.