Earlier this month, 40-year-old Tessica Brown carried a 60-second TikTok explaining how her elegant ponytail was built and shaped in place with Gorilla Glue for more than a month. The events that followed still don’t make sense to her.
“I don’t know why it went viral. I don’t know yet, ”said Brown in an interview with BuzzFeed News.
Within hours, as she anxiously searched for a solution to her accident, Brown became a trend topic known simply as “Gorilla Glue Girl”. People eagerly asked for updates and, incredulous, wondered how it could have happened. Overnight, Brown, a nursery and dance coach in St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana, was catapulted from obscurity to viral fame on the Internet. A talent management approached it and now represents it. Brown discussed how she is still recovering from the lash associated with sudden Internet fame – intense scrutiny, cyberbullying and a huge following of followers, all waiting for what she will do next.
“I washed my hair 15 times and it doesn’t move. Hard where? “said Brown in her call to the Internet. The clip, which has been viewed almost 40 million times, she now says she regrets having shared. In a follow-up video, to demonstrate the seriousness of her situation, the mother of five children dirty their hair with shampoo and scrub, to no avail.
Over the course of six days, people online looked forward to the next update of the ordeal that was unfolding. It ended with a four-hour procedure performed by American plastic surgeon from Ghana Michael Obeng. Obeng successfully removed the patch from what was left of Brown’s hair free of charge for the surgery, which he performed in Los Angeles.
“I can’t even explain how it made me feel. To be able to do nothing for a month. You could scratch my head and feel like cardboard or concrete. When I woke up from surgery it was like Christmas morning, ”said Brown.
As his visibility and followers on social media increased, so did memes, comments and trolls, many of which were oppressive for Brown. Brown’s lawyer recently sent a cease and desist letter to a blogger she said went “too far” in an online campaign calling Brown a “complete liar”.
“Listen, I knew that when I released this video there, there was going to be, you know, some negative reaction. I didn’t think it would be like that, ”said Brown. “You are judging and you don’t even know me.”
Brown said she was particularly hurt by comments from other black women she admired, including Wendy Williams and LisaRaye McCoy, who could not contain their criticisms of her.
In the “Hot Topics” segment of the episode of February 8, The Wendy Williams Show, Williams suggested that Brown’s actions reflected poorly on blacks, while insinuating that she “may have something wrong with her, like mentally”. A Williams representative did not respond to a request for comment.
“It turns out that I liked Wendy,” said Brown. “We just had an entire party to watch her film. I mean, I really liked it, but I mean, so, it made me very angry. “
Also on February 8, McCoy, co-host of Fox Soul’s Cocktails with Queens, criticized Brown on her program in response to a news report from TMZ suggesting that she was considering a lawsuit against the makers of Gorilla Glue. (A McCoy representative did not respond to a request for comment.) Brown vehemently denied the threat of the suit in a telephone interview with BuzzFeed News.
“No. I never said, not once did I, ever. Listen, I’ve been in a car accident – if I’m not injured, I’m not suing anyone,” she said.
Later, in an email exchange with BuzzFeed News, a Brown representative said Brown had spoken badly and, in fact, consulted a Beverly Hills lawyer about the possibility of a lawsuit, but decided not to pursue any further action.
Brown is not participating in the laughter of people who consider his video a comedy. In her mind, she posted the video as a cautionary tale and a cry for help.
“I looked at the video and maybe, as if it were outside of me, the video was hilarious, if it was just a random person just doing it and it wasn’t real, yes, it was funny. But for me to know exactly what was going on, yes, it wasn’t funny, ”she said.
Instead, the ordeal affected Brown and his 11-year-old daughter, who came back from school in tears after being teased by a Gorilla Glue song.
“I’m telling her, no, don’t worry about it, we will learn the verse, the next time they sing for you, sing with them, it will shut them up. But then I go to [the] bathroom and I cried because I was the reason my baby was being ridiculed at school, ”said Brown.
I am happy that mfs really support her in this. When I watched the video a second time, it was hard to laugh because I could tell that the little girl didn’t really know that she had put one of the most powerful stickers in the world in her shit. I hope she recovers well 🙏🏾 #gorillagluegirl
Online, Brown received some words of support from figures like Chance the Rapper, who tweeted, “When I watched the video the second time, it was hard to laugh because I could tell that the little girl really didn’t know that she had put one of the most powerful stickers in the world in her shit. I hope she recovers well. “
Like many people, Darian Symoné Harvin was shocked by Brown’s admission that she had used a strong adhesive to comb her hair and decided to investigate the situation further. The Los Angeles copywriter shared a continuously updated timeline of events through her newsletter, Beauty IRL.
“I felt like I went through this emotional journey first, kind of laughing and having fun, and then my smile started to fade, and then, very quickly, at the end of this video, I could say that it could be beyond just one easy hair repair, ”Harvin told BuzzFeed News.
The collective investment in Brown’s fate reverberated all over the internet. At the center were black women, who could relate on some level to the harrowing sensation of a hair problem.
“This is a black woman and, first of all, our hair is political, no matter how we dress it, so we should start there,” explained Harvin.
“Something that sets this story apart is that there is the point that I have seen people make that no matter what their race is, this would be an outrageous viral story and I would agree with that,” said Harvin. “But I think what added an extra layer of emotion and investment was because of black women, knowing and understanding, number one, when you have a hair problem, but also, number two, it doesn’t matter … how do you wears your hair, is politicized as per our culture. “
Harvin realized that the growing interest in Brown was accompanied by a lot of incorrect information, so she took the time to unmask him in his coverage. To Brown’s critics, Harvin presented what she considers to be a broader question, underlining the whole ordeal: “What did you do for beauty?”
“As black women, we must, I think, look polite, appropriate and professionally groomed when we leave the house, greet each other when our edges are put on, when we look good, when no hair is out of place, Harvin said.
Brown is not immune to the standards of beauty that, according to Harvin, affect “the way we choose to perform.”
“It really comes down to hair manipulation. And honestly, I would say that, whether you’re natural or not, you tried to manipulate your hair in some way, ”said Harvin.
At TikTok, Asante Madrigal, who describes himself as the “king of pop culture”, shared with his followers a three-part analysis of Brown’s story and two additional TikTok updates.
“My first reactions were, honestly, like, is this real?” said the 19-year-old, who routinely analyzes pop culture moments for TikTok.
Despite his initial skepticism, Madrigal invested in identifying a growing interest in the TikTok community, where Brown now has 1.2 million followers.
“I was looking at the view count, it was about 13 million, then 16. As every day, it just increased and I was surprised how not many people are talking about it,” he told BuzzFeed News.
Through its updates, Madrigal was able to assess the public’s mood through the comments section. “I feel that at TikTok it was really negative. I think people are quick to judge and assume things, ”he said.
In covering Brown’s story, Madrigal sympathized with his situation and described online trolling as “cyberbullying”.
“It was an honest mistake, and she never wanted it to happen, she says it clearly all the time. But [TikTok] it was the only way for her to get an unintended solution to this mess, ”said Madrigal.
What Brown’s viral moment did for the Gorilla Glue brand probably still cannot be fully quantified. In culture, the scenario was immortalized as inspiration for a SNL sketch, and the hashtag #GorillaGlue alone has over 240 million cumulative views on TikTok.
In another Brown-inspired viral TikTok, 22-year-old Leah Pierson reaches into her purse for a can of adhesive and displays it as a weapon, “Freeze. Literally.”
“I’ve had a lot of views before, but this is my most viewed video of all time and I’ve been doing social media since I was 12,” she told BuzzFeed News.
Pierson, who is from Los Angeles, followed Brown immediately after watching the viral video.
“I was interested in how she was going to get this out of her head, probably not as invested as everyone else, but I wanted her to have a happy ending. I didn’t want her to go bald or anything, so I’m glad it ended the way it did, ”said Pierson.
Although she could not relate to Brown’s decision to comb her hair with the patch, Pierson admitted that she used Gorilla Glue for other beauty purposes.
“I really couldn’t talk about it, because I used Gorilla Glue to glue my nail back on. I mean, it’s different because it’s not your hair, but I definitely used to stick my nails together and I know girls who do that too, ”she said.
Pierson feels empathy for Brown’s hair disaster and online interest.
“I just think it’s a part of the black humor – I say all the time that our mood is different. The only reason we are so invested in it – because, yes, she is a black woman and that is funny for us, but it is funny for anyone now, ”she said.
As Madrigal pointed out, Brown gained a large following on social media after just a few weeks. She launched a line of merchandise with the slogan “Bonded for life”, capitalizing on this viral moment. Elsewhere online, his vocals have already received the musical treatment to create the soundtrack for a series of TikTok dances.
Any options that remain on the table that would extend this viral moment to something more profitable or sustainable are unknown to Brown. Even so, she is sure that she is committed to her work with children and as a dance coach above all.
“I have the nursery and the dance team,” she said. “Whatever I do, I will have to come after that.”