The Curated Chaos Aesthetic
The Internet Lives for Chaos
Often equated with the butterfly effect, chaos theory is the mathematical study of initial conditions and their slight variations that result in vastly different consequences. For example, could the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas? If the butterfly flapped its wings a mile north, would the tornado land in Canada instead? This method of analysis has been applied across situations and industries for decades. But it can also be used to understand a wildly popular internet trend: chaoscore.
Chaoscore is difficult to describe, as the aesthetic consists of wide-ranging, nonsensical, and often low-quality content mashups. Various references to celebrity culture, internet language, and even old meme trends from the last two decades are curated in utter randomness to create an oddly specific form of modern “art.” The ultimate butterfly effect if you will. It can take the form of chaos edits, “shitposts,” and various meme styles. And these posts have amassed hundreds of millions, sometimes billions, of views on platforms like TikTok and Instagram. If you’ve clicked on any of the above links, you’ll notice that chaoschore is almost disturbingly bizarre. But it has cultural gravity.
Should companies be engaging with something as unpredictable and unrestrained as chaoscore? Well they’re already starting to, at least accidentally.
Amazon recently ignited conversation after a chaotic TikTok ad went viral. The post turned out to be a glitch in the algorithm — not an actual Amazon creation — which was disappointing for some fans, including Verge reporter Makena Kelly who called it, “the best ad I’ve ever seen in my life.” The positive feedback has some like Vox’s Rebecca Jennings predicting, “it’s probably only a matter of time before Denny’s makes a chaos edit of someone choking on pancakes set to Charli XCX’s ‘Unlock It.’” Case in point: some brands like Slim Jim have already amassed millions of likes and followers by mastering the art of shitposting.
If this all seems super weird and nonsensical, well that’s kind of the point. The exclusivity of “getting it” is part of the appeal. And chaoscore has historical grounding. The online tone became widely adopted in the midst of quarantine. Like the Dada movement and other art forms rooted in a “wartime” context, chaoscore intentionally breaks norms and defies logic in the face of conflict. In other words, the internet’s current obsession with chaos is a reflection of societal uncertainty. When nothing makes sense in the world, nonsense becomes a logical form of expression. And like other internet trends and identities we’ve explored, online discourse shapes the wider culture we operate in.
This article first appeared in the Media Genius newsletter on August 19, 2021. Subscribe for more signals and innovations in media, culture, and tech.
