George Takei is a master of social media. His Facebook page has 7.1 million likes. That’s pretty much the population of Switzerland. He has 1.2 million followers on Twitter and uncounted millions of fans from his Star Trek days. How has he achieved such a following? He did it with his charm, his humour, his incredible up-to-dateness with contemporary pop culture, and, perhaps most importantly, his staunch support for gay rights around the world. George Takei is 77 years old but is more adept with the internet than most teenagers. Here are some examples of his mastery.
1. This recently floated around the internet, George Takei’s individual responses to messages penned by youths at an anti gay-marriage parade. Watch as he takes down each protester with cheeky, witty, unstoppable devastation.
2. Although he’s 77 years old, he spans generational divides like a pro. Here is proof: a double-barrelled Monty Python-Game of Thrones referencing tweet.
Cross-generational culture test. No liking/sharing unless you get BOTH references immediately. No spoilers. pic.twitter.com/Kw5GNL3wvR
— George Takei (@GeorgeTakei) June 17, 2014
3. George Takei is a regular on The Simpsons and Futurama, ensuring he’s well known to the millions of fans of these shows even if they’ve never seen an episode of Star Trek before. This is George Takei in the future:
4. George Takei tweeted this screenshot of a poll he designed for his heterosexual fans to establish when and why they decided to become heterosexual:
5. George Takei’s Facebook proves he has mastered memes. Not only this, but he understands pretty much every internet joke and handles them as well as he handled the Starship Enterprise. This is his proof that the facepalm originated in Star Trek.
6. Finally, although very much a grown-up, George Takei is not above a penis joke:
An apartment complex in Houston. Oh Myyy… pic.twitter.com/d05GXjUqey — George Takei (@GeorgeTakei) June 12, 2014
Follow The Iris on Twitter. Follow George Takei on Twitter or Facebook.
———-
