‘Do You See My Bulge?’ Ted Cruz Asks Unfortunate Question While Making Erroneous Claim About Alleged Charlie Kirk Killer
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) “repeated” a question about a “bulge” he thought had been written on a shell casing by the alleged assassin of Charlie Kirk.
Kirk was shot and killed last Wednesday as he spoke at Utah Valley University. Prosecutors have charged 22-year-old Tyler Robinson with the killing. According to the charging documents, Robinson had a transgender partner and accused Kirk of spreading hate.
Police say Robinson wrote a message on each of the four shell casings he had on him. On one of them, the inscription read, “NoTices Bulge: OWO What’s This?”
Cruz appeared on Tuesday’s edition of The Source on CNN, where he alleged the suspect had inscribed “transgender slogans” on the shell casings.
Host Kaitlan Collins responded, “I don’t remember there being a transgender one on there. I remember him saying there was one that said, ‘If you can read this, you’re gay.’ It was referencing internet memes. But on what you just said there about investigating–”
The senator interrupted and insisted one of the inscriptions pertained to “transgenderism”:
Kaitlan, there is a transgender– there’s a reference to, Do you see my bulge? Which is, I’m told, is an online meme for transgenderism.
And Director [Kash] Patel testified that the murderer here was living with his romantic partner, who was a transgender man, transitioning to being a woman. And so, you have both the shell casing that directly references transgenderism, and in fact, Charlie Kirk was murdered moments after he was asked a question about transgender mass shootings. And that’s when the shooter fired.
According to the authoritative Know Your Meme website, “NoTices Bulge: OWO What’s This?” is a meme dating to 2013. In language that is English, but nonetheless virtually impenetrable, the site explains:
The earliest reported use of the catchphrase, or at least part of the phrase, dates back to January 6th, 2013, when DeviantArt user CookiMuffinFaic posted a screenshot of a fanfiction cover featuring furry characters titled, “OwO What is this I’m working on? A fanfic cover! :D”
However, the meme didn’t really take off until 2015, when Imgur user MinotaurusPro posted a meme depicting two furries roleplaying online. In the art, one of the furries writes to the other, “nuzzles u back and pounces on u and notices your buldge ‘OwO what’s this…?” In the case of the meme, “bulge” refers to noticing the outline of a man’s crotch.
The KYM site explicitly states, “Notably, this phrase is not a reference to transgender ideology, but a meme. It is a reference to furry and online roleplay culture, largely used in an ironic and demeaning way.”
