Take a deep breath and prepare yourself, because the "saga of the green dildos" is going to get really, really dumb.
Now take another one, just to steel yourself—this story involves crypto and memecoins, after all.
Ready? Okay.
Perhaps you've heard that people have been tossing lime green dildos at WNBA players for the last few weeks. Front Office Sports counts five such incidents; other sites say six.
Two men, Delbert Carver and Kaden Lopez, have so far been arrested. Both are under 25—young, but old enough to know that throwing sex toys at professional female athletes is both unsafe and deeply disrespectful.
WNBA players have been emphatic about their dislike and disapproval of these actions, which have been widely covered even in outlets like Cosmopolitan, which railed against "these idiots throwing dildos onto the court" who "don’t care about what women deserve or how disgusting and violating their actions are."
Meanwhile, Donald Trump Jr. recently posted an image to Instagram showing his dad on the White House roof, tossing a large green dildo down at women on a basketball court. (Representative reply comment: "Cool. Epstein files now?")
Why would anyone pay money for a WNBA ticket, only to throw dildos at the players? According to the Associated Press, both men arrested so far claimed that the incidents were pranks, with one saying the idea was intended "to go viral." If you read that and find yourself wondering why you'd want green dildos to go viral, USA Today got the "EXCLUSIVE" answer:
It was crypto bros.
Pushing a memecoin.
Called "Green Dildo Coin."
That now has a market cap of $12 million.
The paper talked to someone representing Green Dildo Coin, who explained that the stunts were done for truly noble reasons. Indeed, they were a form of "protest" against injustice.
Of course, because this is crypto, the injustice being protested appears to be that memecoin backers can't make bajillions of dollars on worthless memecoins without that cash going to crypto influencers! Here's how USA Today describes the logic:
The coordinated effort is a strategic protest against what the meme coin creators view as a small group of individuals controlling the crypto space. From the beginning, part of the group's mission has been to cause enough chaos to "get a voice" and media attention. The spokesman said they've since secured that and plan to continue with their rollout, though wouldn't reveal what the group has planned next.
It turns out that, even to its boosters, the crypto world is somewhat "toxic" and "many smaller players in the space are struggling to keep up with the influx of influencers and scammers." According to someone from Green Dildo Coin—words that I never thought I'd have to write—"We knew that in order to get a voice in the space... we had to go out and do some viral stunts to save us from having to pay that influencer cabal, sacrifice our souls and the fate of the project."
The Athletic found a livestream on X in which someone associated with Green Dildo Coin said of the disruptions, "This is empowering to every f---ing crypto community to start thinking outside the box. Get creative and f---ing do something that makes people actually laugh. Memecoins should make you laugh... The whole mission with this was focus on making an impact in crypto culture."
I guess "let's juice the price of a memecoin to get on TV and make mad money" doesn't have quite the same ring as talking about protests, "impact," and soul-saving.
Why all of this had to be done at the expense of professional women's sports instead of, say, MMA cagefighting is never explained. But Minnesota Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve had her own idea. "The sexualization of women is what's used to hold women down," she told The Athletic, "and this is no different. These people that are doing this should be held accountable."
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