Coconut-Pilled

About

Coconut-Pilled, sometimes spelled Coconutpilled or Coconut Pilled, is an internet slang term used primarily by progressives and former Kamala Harris critics who express semi-ironic support of the vice president replacing Joe Biden as the Democratic nominee for president in the 2024 Election. The term is inspired by Harris' infamous "Fell out Of a Coconut Tree" quote, signaling that those who are "coconut-pilled" are embracing Harris' bizarre tics and weirdness.

Origin

On May 10th, 2023, the GOP War Room YouTube account posted a video of American Vice President Kamala Harris delivering an anecdote about how her mother used to "give us a hard time" and say, "I don't know what's wrong with you young people, you think you just fell out of a coconut tree? You exist in the context of all in which you live and what came before you." The video received roughly 23,000 views in four months (shown below).

The clip became a meme and was used to criticize Harris in the following months and is arguably the most famous of an extensive collection of videos featuring her acting bizarrely or saying surreal quotes.

However, following President Joe Biden's alarming performance at the 2024 CNN Presidential Debate, some Democrats and others online voiced that Harris should step in and replace Biden as the nominee in the 2024 election.

On June 28th, 2024, Twitter / X user @QueenRayna1337^[1] responded "The libs are becoming coconut pilled" to a tweet by @hopelesslystoic asking about Kamala Harris. Though the tweet only gained two likes in one week, it is the earliest known instance of the term appearing online (shown below).

Spread

Over the following days, calls for Biden to drop out from Democratic insiders and politicians grew louder. While it's not definite that if Biden were to drop out, Harris would take his place as the nominee, she is seen as the most likely replacement by many.^[2]

This led to a surge in ironic memeing supporting Kamala Harris, as people once critical of her began to jokingly embrace her oddities and make memes casting quotes like "coconut tree" and "What Can Be, Unburdened by What Has Been" as positives.

The term for this switch was dubbed getting "coconut-pilled" in several viral posts on Twitter. For example, on July 2nd, 2024, Twitter user @KELLYWEILL^[3] tweeted that the ironic KHive posting was "the most energized the twitter Dem electorate has been in about a year." She added, "I think there’s probably something optimistic in that. call yourself ‘coconut-pilled’ or whatever." The post gained over 730 retweets and 12,000 likes in one day (shown below).

On July 3rd, journalist Mehdi Hasan^[4] tweeted an argument that Harris should replace Biden as the nominee, tweeting the article with the phrase "I'm coconut-pilled," gaining over 150 retweets and 1,200 likes in a matter of hours (seen below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

Unavailable.

External References