Paraqeet shows #DoorsorWheels ignites polite Twitter debates
The internet experts were hard at work in March pondering that age-old dilemma:
Are there more doors or wheels in the world?
By all accounts, it started when Twitter user Ryan Nixon (@NewYorkNixon) asked followers to vote in a poll on the subject and more than 223,000 people responded, with wheels beating out doors.
A Paraqeet search showed the question quickly spread on social media, with everyone from the NFL Network and Lego to Opera Philadelphia and presidential press secretary Jen Psaki defending either #TeamWheels or #TeamDoors. (For the record, Psaki is #TeamWheels.)
Unlike most arguments today, this one didn’t devolve into typical online name calling. Twitter was filled with thoughtful questions over what should be included in the count: toy cars, model trains, dollhouses, refrigerators, advent calendars? Whichever side respondents chose — much like the “is the dress black or blue” debate a few years ago — everyone felt their answer was correct and relied on explaining their own thinking instead of bullying the opposition.
But Southwest Airlines had a different perspective:
Yet another user was convinced his wheel argument closed the debate.
Twitter was right back at him with this:
Higher ed got in the game, with countless interviews with professors from a cross section of disciplines. Texas A&M University, for instance, talked to in-house experts in everything from hospitality to architecture, who openly waxed philosophical while trying to decide. A dean in the architecture school noted she hoped there are more wheels because “We have wheels to take us places … rather than doors that keep us out of places.” Indeed, #TeamWheels won the day with staff and students alike.
One argument did make some on #TeamDoors reconsider their rationale:
The debate’s tenor struck @OilyEDM, who wrote, “The arguments are getting more and more advanced! Greatest thing to happen to the Internet in a long time.”
Alas, Paraqeet shows that, less than three weeks after the original post started the debate, interest in the light break from the stresses of the pandemic, inflation and war is waning.
Ryan Nixon, it was fun while it lasted.