Beverages are getting more and more expensive these days—but six Coke Zeros for $25? That’s something else entirely.
In a viral TikTok, user TheBirdNest (@thabirdnest) shared how this predicament unfolded.
“Please tell me why my wife just came home, and I asked for a six-pack of Coke Zero,” he said. “And she tells me, ‘Your Cokes were expensive. They were $25′”
“$25? I’m like – ‘I thought she was playing a prank on me.’ I’m like, ‘There’s no possible way.’ And then she shows me the receipt, and sure enough, she rang it up six times,” he said, the camera zooming in on six Cokes rung up for $4.27 each.”
His wife, who was also amused by the situation, gestured to the six-pack on the kitchen counter and added, “There’s six barcodes on here.”
It should also be noted that she ended up buying OG Coke instead of Coke Zero. The video amassed 4.7 million views.
The TikToker didn’t immediately respond to The Mary Sue’s request for comment via TikTok comment.
Commenters react
While the clip was lighthearted, many comments took it seriously. “This isn’t funny… It’s concerning,” one wrote.
“Wooooow,” a second added. “I would not post that.”
While a third said, “Bro please tell me you’re in charge of finances.”
Similarly, a fourth exclaimed, “Broooo THAT’s your emergency contact.”
While a fifth quipped, “Registered voter here…..”
The TikToker defends his wife
Responding to these comments, the TikToker made several videos.
In the first follow-up, which was in response to the comment calling the video “concerning,” he said it was an “honest mistake” and insisted that the only “concerning” part was how people seemed to felt they knew his wife from a 20-second clip.
In a second, where a commenter asked how he and his wife “function,” TheBirdNest said sarcastically that he and his wife have two adult carers.
Moving on to the third, TheBirdNest replied to a comment remarking how the wife “definitely married the right person” by asking: “How sad would it be if she made a mistake like this and I absolutely dogged her?”
@thabirdnest There’s no way this happened… #tiktokshopaffiliate #tiktokshop ♬ original sound – TheBirdNest
More defense
Finally, in a fourth clip, he urged viewers to learn from his experience — explaining that going viral isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be.
“Social media is not for the weak, and if you’re trying to get famous on TikTok, let this be a good example of why you should rethink that,” he began. “You will see that like 60% of the people that comment on your video, the way that they take things out of context and they try and skew things is just… absolutely absurd,” he said.
“The amount of people that watched this video and all of a sudden thought they knew who my wife was in a 20-second clip. You have to absolutely go in with the mindset that not everybody’s going to agree with you and that’s OK.”
He continued, “When I posted this video, I knew that there would be comments. Like, people comment saying: ‘You posted it, didn’t you know, this is going to happen?’ Obviously. I’ve done social media for like four years now on TikTok. Just know: 75% of your comments are going to be people that are absolutely insane. You just don’t understand the way that they think. But either it can make you crumble, or you can just troll them and continue to make engagement out of those comments.”
Are commenters getting too parasocial?
Ultimately, this video can be argued as being yet another example of commenters getting too parasocial about a TikToker’s relationship.
The term “parasocial,” which the Merriam-Webster dictionary describes as a “one-sided emotional connection,” is usually reserved for celebrities — but in an increasingly digital world, we are seeing regular people at the center of viral videos be on the receiving end of parasocial discourse. We’ve seen it before with the likes of ‘Couch Guy’ and ‘West Elm Caleb.’
Getting parasocial over a six-pack of Coke might sound completely absurd, but seemingly, that’s just the nature of the internet these days.
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