Two photos of four people sitting in a row on the MRT were posted on the Diaozui Hotline Memes Facebook page without much context on Monday afternoon, Sep. 28.
Within a few hours, the photos attracted a lot of attention because there were a myriad of ways to read into the images — the most pronounced of them all is the insinuation that the four people are two couples engaged in some sort of promiscuous relationship in full display in public.
The post naturally puzzled commenters and piqued their interests.
What's going on?
In the first photo, a woman in a green shirt is seen leaning her head on the shoulder of a man in a black t-shirt.
Meanwhile, the black t-shirt man's earphones are split between him and another woman in a white shirt.
Photo via Facebook / Diaozui Hotline Memes.
In the second photo, the white shirt woman is seen leaning her head against a man in a red shirt.
Photo via Facebook / Diaozui Hotline Memes.
Speculation and denigration
Within two hours, the post had been shared over 2,000 times, with more than one hundred comments, mostly due to people being confused about the relationship between the individuals pictured.
Some of the commenters expressed their confusion...
Photo via Facebook / Diaozui Hotline Memes.
... while others threw out their own guesses for what was happening.
Photo via Facebook / Diaozui Hotline Memes.
Photo via Facebook / Diaozui Hotline Memes.
Photo via Facebook / Diaozui Hotline Memes.
Photo via Facebook / Diaozui Hotline Memes.
Some online, however, were not so amused with the speculation happening.
Photo via Facebook / Diaozui Hotline Memes.
And another suggested that if the faces of the people in the photo were unblurred, the whole story would be out within a week.
Photo via Facebook / Diaozui Hotline Memes.
Mystery solved
But it did not have to take a week for the mystery to unravel.
The dynamics of their relationship was solved in an hour as those photographed stepped forward to explain what was going on and diss the meme page for putting strangers up for ridicule -- or, also known as, "trending" people.
Woman in white
The first to comment was supposedly the woman in white, who shared earphones with the man on her right while leaning on the shoulder of the man on her left.
Photo via Facebook / Diaozui Hotline Memes.
She explained that the man whose shoulder she was leaning on is her father, while the man she was listening to music with is her brother.
She also questioned why her mother was cropped out of the photos.
Woman in green
The other woman pictured, the one in the green shirt, commented soon afterward, opening her comment with a similar "First of all...".
Photo via Facebook / Diaozui Hotline Memes.
She explained that she is the girlfriend of the man in black, and that the reason her boyfriend was sharing earphones with his sister was because her AirPods were out of battery.
Man in black
And finally, the boyfriend/ brother chimed in, with a short and to-the-point comment.
Photo via Facebook / Diaozui Hotline Memes.
However, when he shared the post on his own profile, he didn't mince his words.
Photo via Facebook.
Meme page apologises
Less than three hours after posting the photos, the Facebook post by Diaozui Hotline Memes was no longer available as it was deleted by the page.
The Facebook page then posted an apology about three hours after the initial photos were put up, writing that they "thought it was harmless at first" but decided to take down the post after one of the photos' subjects messaged them.
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Top photo via Facebook / Diaozui Hotline Memes.