Horrifying Results as Man Exercises Only One Single Muscle

In a grotesque twist to the online trend of

In a grotesque twist to the online trend of "looksmaxxing," a term referring to male incels looking to maximize their own physical attractiveness, a TikTok user has spent over 160 days working out just a single trapezius muscle.

In daily update videos, the college student, who goes by the fitting online handle TheCrookedMon, showed off the results of his unorthodox "looks minimizing" strategy: a massively imbalanced shoulder muscle diagonally — and unsettlingly — stretching from the left side of his head to his left shoulder.

Why? Besides a modicum of internet clout, we're still not entirely sure.

To get his very particular gains, TheCrookedMon did daily shrugs on his left side only, using a variety of objects, including a dog, a backpack, and a pack of drinks at the grocery store.

Instead of cheering him on, commenters appeared largely concerned for his health.

"Bro you proved your point," one user wrote, with a crying emoji.

"Bro stop please," another comment reads.

Others were more impressed.

"This is literally the biggest flex I've ever seen," one user wrote.

There’s a kid who has only trained one trap for most of a year and it’s one of the most autistic things I’ve ever seen pic.twitter.com/3d0GRbZPKi

— Bill Coyne (@MiloAgonistes) April 11, 2025

The trend became so big, it spawned an entire memecoin, dubbed $TRAPMAN. According to DexScreener, the coin spiked to a value of $0.00003649 — yes, you read that decimal point correctly — when it launched on April 13. Unsurprisingly, the dubious asset crashed almost immediately, wiping out most of its value.

The jury is still out on whether TheCrookedMon could be damaging his body, but chances are he'll be fine in the long run. Researchers have found that primarily focusing on training just one side of the body could still have plenty of benefits for the other side.

It's a particularly pertinent reality for those recovering from an injury or missing part of their body. Research has shown that training just one side could even build muscle mass in an unused, injured limb through the triggering of neural pathways, a phenomenon referred to as the "cross-training effect" or "cross-education."

However, that doesn't mean we condone the kind of eyebrow-raising workout regimen TheCrookedMon chose for himself — there are far better ways to design a unilateral training plan.

In a tongue-in-cheek April 2 video, he attempted to explain why he intentionally sacrificed his looks.

"I was scrolling TikToks in my Ferrari, and I kept getting these looksmaxxing TikToks," he said. "And they were like, 'Do this, do that, you'll look more attractive, you'll get more women."

"And it's like, people have that problem?" he added. "I've the opposite problem. I get so many DMs I don't even have time to get through them all."

"If I have the opposite problem, then I need the opposite solution," TheCrookedMon argued.

Worse things are on the horizon: Over the past month, TheCrookedMan has now started working out just his right leg.

More on the incel community: A Google-Backed AI Startup Is Hosting Chatbots Modeled After Real-Life School Shooters — and Their Victims

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Horrifying Results as Man Exercises Only One Single Muscle

Former Google CEO Alarmed by Teen Boys Falling in Love With AI Girlfriends

Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt seems mighty concerned about today's youth becoming obsessed with AI girlfriends. 

TFW AI GF

Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt seems mighty concerned about today's youth becoming obsessed with AI girlfriends.

During a recent interview on "The Prof G Show" podcast, Schmidt suggested that both parents and young people are ill-equipped to handle what he calls an "unexpected problem of existing technology."

These AI companions are, as the former Google CEO said, so "perfect" that they end up enthralling young people and causing them to disconnect from the real world.

"That kind of obsession is possible," he told NYU Stern professor Scott Galloway, "especially for people who are not fully formed."

While women are also turning to AI romantic partners, Schmidt said that young men are particularly susceptible as they "turn to the online world for enjoyment and sustenance." Thanks to algorithms pushing problematic content, these young men often stumble across dangerous content, be it extremist influencers or manipulative chatbots.

"You put a 12- or 13-year-old in front of these things, and they have access to every evil as well as every good in the world," he told Galloway, "and they’re not ready to take it."

Scared Straight

We've seen this play out recently in the real world to devastating effect when a 14-year-old boy in Florida who died by suicide at the beginning of the year after a "Game of Thrones"-themed chatbot hosted on Character.AI encouraged him to do so.

Though Setzer's story is far more extreme than most, it highlights the dangers posed by these lifelike chatbots — and without proper regulation, these tragedies are likely to keep occurring. We've also recently seen AI characters that encourage eating disorders and engage in sexual grooming behavior toward underage users.

Indeed, Schmidt went on to note that laws like the sweeping Section 230 rule that protects tech companies from being held liable for harm caused by their products shield firms like Character.AI — which, ironically, Google has provided with billions of dollars in backing — from accountability.

Because these technologies are so valuable, the ex-Google chief said, "it’s likely to take some kind of a calamity to cause a change in regulation" — though it's hard to imagine anything more calamitous than a teen dying after his AI girlfriend pushed him to suicide.

More on AI gfs: Replika CEO: It's Fine for Lonely People to Marry Their AI Chatbots

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Trump Posts AI-Generated Image of Kamala Harris as Joseph Stalin, But Instead It Just Looks Like Mario

Donald Trump shared an AI-generated image of Kamala Harris designed to invoke Joseph Stalin — but she actually looked much more like Mario.

MAGA's AI onslaught continues.

This weekend, doubling down on accusations that presidential contender Kamala Harris is a Marxist communist (she isn't), former president Donald Trump took to Truth Social to boost a clearly AI-generated image of Harris donned in communist attire, Stalinesque mustache and all.

It wasn't the first time that Trump has used AI to attack Harris. Last month, days after falsely accusing his rival of using AI to fake the appearance of large crowds greeting her at a campaign stop — and, in the process, arguing that a presidential candidate using AI to create fake images should warrant disqualification on "election interference" grounds — Trump posted an AI-drawn image of a red-clad Harris speaking to a herd of Soviet-like figures, a hammer-and-sickle flag waving overhead.

It is, however, the first time he's boosted propaganda that makes his opponent look like the iconic Nintendo character Mario. Here we go!

The image was taken from a Substack post by a writer who works at the Gateway Pundit, a far-right digital publisher notorious for publishing stories promoting baseless allegations that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump (copious evidence, and many judges he appointed, have found those claims to be false.) Trump reposted the image and a link to the Substack post — which described Harris as a "rock-ribbed socialist" — without comment.

The image is ridiculous, of course. It doesn't look at all real, and as netizens pointed out on social media, the fake Harris' fictional stache moreso invokes the vibe of Nintendo's beloved cartoon plumber than it does the feared Soviet dictator.

"The only thing this post makes me wanna do is vote for Kamala," wrote one X user, "and then play Super Mario World on my old Super Nintendo system."

"BREAKING," added comedian Jason Selvig, "Donald Trump accuses Kamala Harris of being a heroic plumber who saved Princess Peach from Bowser and his evil Koopa army."

Convincing or not, though, the image does highlight the reality that generative AI — particularly Elon Musk's guardrail-free Grok model — is increasingly being used as an easy-bake propaganda oven. After all, not all image-based propaganda is expressly designed to look real. It's often cartoonish and exaggerated by nature, and in this case, doesn't exactly look like something intended to sway staunchly blue voters from Harris' camp. Rather, this sort of propagandized image, while supporting a broader Trumpworld effort to portray Harris as a far-left extremist, reads much more like a deeply partisan appeal to the online MAGA base.

To wit, though many self-avowed Harris voters mocked the fake picture, the likes of right-wing X poster Phillip "Catturd" Buchanan latched onto it — as did his followers, who responded with quips about "Comrade Kamala" and, in several cases, AI-generated images of their own.

Trump wasn't the only far-right figure to employ AI this weekend to further communist allegations against Harris. On Monday, in response to an X post from the Harris campaign that referenced Trump's vow to be dictator on "day one" of his second term, X owner Musk used the platform he bought in 2022 to share his own AI image of Harris decked out in communist garb.

"Kamala vows to be a communist dictator on day one," Musk sarcastically captioned the image. "Can you believe she wears that outfit!?" The post has yet to receive a Community Note indicating the use of AI, and is also lacking a fact-check to the false allegation that Harris has vowed to be a "communist dictator on day one" (she hasn't.)

Musk's clearly faked photo drew criticism from users across X, ranging from "Happy Days" actor Henry Winkler to former United Nations deputy secretary-general Jan Eliasson.

"Just straight up disinformation, with no parody label or community note, from the owner of this site and the guy with the most followers," wrote Zeteo editor-in-chief and former MSNBC commentator Mehdi Hasan. "Anyone who claimed he wouldn't use this platform to push rightwing conspiracies and help elect Trump must be feeling pretty dumb right now."

The use of AI by Trump — not to mention his richest and most influential supporter — to further highly politicized attack lines reflects the ever-increasing surreality of the 2024 election, a political contest being battled out on the back of a nearly-ten-year stretch of chaos, fake news, and the endless whir of muddied social media information. It also certainly underscores a recent argument made by The Atlantic's Charlie Warzel, who observed that the "meme-loving" MAGA aesthetic and the hyperreal tone of AI slop are, in the murky annals of social platforms like X, increasingly merging together.

On that note, like Trump's Truth Social-boosted Lenin-slash-Mario image, Musk's X post drew some support in addition to derision.

"I can believe it," wrote one X user in the billionaire's comments. "Kammunism."

More on Trump and AI: After Falsely Accusing Kamala Harris of Using AI, Donald Trump Posts AI Slop About Her on Twitter

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Former CEO Blames Working From Home for Google’s AI Struggles, Regrets It Immediately

Billionaire ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt is walking back his questionable claim that remote work is to blame for Google's AI failures.

Eyes Will Roll

Ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt is walking back his questionable claim that remote work is to blame for Google slipping behind OpenAI in Silicon Valley's ongoing AI race.

On Tuesday, Stanford University published a YouTube video of a recent talk that Schmidt gave at the university's School of Engineering. During that talk, when asked why Google was falling behind other AI firms, Schmidt declared that Google's AI failures stem from its decision to let its staffers enjoy remote work and, with it, a bit of "work-life balance."

"Google decided that work-life balance and going home early and working from home was more important than winning," the ex-Googler told the classroom. "And the reason startups work is because people work like hell."

The comment understandably sparked criticism. After all, work-life balance is important, and Google isn't a startup.

And it didn't take long for Schmidt to eat his words.

"I misspoke about Google and their work hours," Schmidt told The Wall Street Journal in an emailed statement. "I regret my error."

In a Stanford talk posted today, Eric Schmidt says the reason why Google is losing to @OpenAI and other startups is because Google only has people coming in 1 day per week ? pic.twitter.com/XPxr3kdNaC

— Alex Kehr (@alexkehr) August 13, 2024

Ctrl Alt Delete

In the year 2024, Google is one of the most influential tech giants on the planet, and a federal judge in Washington DC ruled just last week that Google has monopoly power over the online search market. Its pockets are insanely deep, meaning that it can compete in the industry talent war and devote a ridiculous amount of resources to its AI efforts.

What it didn't do, though, was publicly release a chatbot before OpenAI did. OpenAI, which arguably isn't exactly a startup anymore either, was the first to wrench open that Pandora's box — and Google has been playing catch-up ever since.

So in other words, not sleeping on the floors of Google's lavish facilities isn't exactly the problem here.

In a Wednesday statement on X-formerly-Twitter, the Alphabet Workers Union declared in response to Schmidt's comments that "flexible work arrangements don't slow down our work."

"Understaffing, shifting priorities, constant layoffs, stagnant wages and lack of follow-through from management on projects," the statement continued, "these factors slow Google workers down every day."

Later on Wednesday, as reported by The Verge, Stanford removed the video of Schmidt's talk from YouTube upon the billionaire's request.

More on Google AI: Google's Demo of Its Latest AI Tech Was an Absolute Train Wreck

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