Gather 'round, my dear historical and tech enthusiasts, as we trudge back to the Middle Ages, the 14th century, to be precise. Picture this: Europe is in the grip of the Black Death, the bubonic plague that wiped out roughly half of the continent's population, transforming the streets of cities into silent epitaphs and forever altering the course of history.
Yet in this parallel universe I've wheeled out my Delorean-esque quill and revamped it with a dash of digital dazzle, imagine if the perennial purveyors of dance challenges and DIY hacks, TikTok, bless its viral heart, had been around to, *ahem*, "spread the word" way back then. Would the pestilent plague have gone quite so viral? Let's dive into this social media fairytale plagued with hashtags and medieval memes.
The Renaissance Influencer Era
Our story starts not with a rat, but with a content creator in Florence, let’s call her Bella. Bella isn't just any influencer; she’s a pioneering star of the PreCarga tag, the trending medieval subset of TikTok dedicated to pre-1450 content. Instead of peddling skincare routines and unboxings of plague masks (not to be confused with skincare), she introspectively shares what the locals call "rat facts", tales, tips, and, err, occasional musings on the morbid quirks of daily existence.
So in walks Bella, trusty plague mask in hand, with her contagious energy. With videos tagged #PestilenceParade raking in views, she catapults not only herself but also the stodgy, heavy-laden burden of disease awareness into everyone's For You Page (FYP). Perhaps if TikTok taught the world anything by rewriting history, it’d be to remember that some things aren't better for being seen or "liked".
Spreading Faster than a Duck's Quack
Let’s not underestimate the virality of this virtual feast of plague content. As the sooty black fingers of the disease curl around Europe’s cities, Pierre from Paris quickly commandeers the channel @LeFleaMarket to share day-in-the-life clips, each smattered with medically dubious, albeit enthusiastically bandied-around witchcraft tips.“Qu’est-ce qui se passe?” he chirps, skipping through flea filled lanes. Unbeknownst to our audience, Pierre is also stirring the cogs of the biohazard machinery cleverly dubbed #BuggingOutBeLens.
From London to Lisbon, the masses wear their fear on their oversized, TikTok-influenced sleeves, sharing short spotlights of Maximilian's Mouldy Bread Diet challenge. It's getting unprecedented shares and duets, a nutrition frenzy the plague itself couldn’t squash (much less the FTC if they existed back then). HistORIcal scientists take note: there's something about 45-second content chunks that makes morbid humour an oddly effective preventive measure.
Education with a Dash of Desperation
Of course, not everything on medieval TikTok would be cat-herding antics or doltish dance-offs to lute music. Live streams from so-called 'plagued posts'/'tavern takeover's provided vital updates from quarantined areas, much like today’s cautionary Instagram yachters but with more vinegar-scented airs.
Doctors, who previously struggled to explain how bad humours were Gods-gifted via rat epistles, found themselves rendering advice into 15-second snippets, scroll less, stress less. "Stay safe," they'd intone, crafting aromatic protective potions with ties to your algo-ritual preference. Or dentists, unwelcome as they were, demonstrating "proper rat-handling technique" perhaps would have saved a few enamel-less citizens as well.
The Ultimate Cancel Culture
Alas for all our nostalgia savouring the thou-times it wasn't all roses and viral milestones. Trends hit their answerable zenith when forgiveness arrived in the form of "Cancel The Plague Dance-off!." Participating towns declare their rid-of-plague status through narrated reels dubbed by ghostly Enya-like clones lamenting the bubonic bombs once fallen.
In conclusion, perhaps the digitalisation of the Black Death would indeed cause more than a few ripples on the timeline. That black and deathly carousel of rat and wit, dancing mournfully on infirm embers of history's cache, might possibly have impressed upon their TikTock-worthy forebearers the equal necessity of cutting-edge solutions as much as our desire for connection, education, and, yes, a good old renaissance jig.
So next time you scroll through your modern feed, bounce an ironic smirk up to ye ancient spirits of times past. If only they’d known that history didn’t just belong in dusty books, nor rats to time-trapped tales.
