BY OLIVIA SMITH, St. Petersburg High

Nothing about the Internet should surprise us anymore, but here are a few particularly creepy things from 2012:

Holmies: Anyone familiar with Tumblr knows there are quite a few weirdos lurking. Weird, but usually innocent. The same cannot be said for “Holmies,” high school and college girls who share an attraction to young mass murderers. The name “Holmie” comes from James Holmes, the 25-year-old shooter who killed 12 people at the premiere of The Dark Knight Rises.
The two dozen or so blogs post pictures of Holmes with captions such as “marry me,” “misunderstood beauty,” and even song lyrics about forbidden love. The girls also include pictures and fan fiction about Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, the high school perps of the Columbine massacre who killed 13 fellow students and severely injured dozens more. These disturbing blogs have already started idolizing Adam Lanza, the man who murdered 26 people at Sandy Hook Elementary School last Friday.

Bronies: Condescending news coverage of the Brony phenomenon has been an integral part of 2012 pop culture. Bronies are a fandom of teenage to middle-age men obsessed with the children’s show My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. While “brony” is the term used on the mainstream Internet to describe the male fandom, some who post ponies on the infamous image-sharing website, 4chan, identify themselves as “colts,” while the few female fans of the show have been referred to as “pegasisters.”
There are huge brony conventions all over the world, where grown men can cosplay as their favorite pony. BronyCon is just around the corner this August, in Baltimore. The diamond pass is $2,000.00.

Living dolls: Youtube beauty gurus have become a significant genre on the Internet. Beauty gurus are mostly cute teenage girls who give detailed tutorials on makeup, fashion and hair. Although some may call them materialistic, no one could call them creepier than living dolls.
Although many girls yearn for the body of Kim Kardashian, the hair of Kate Middleton, the eyes of Amanda Seyfried and, of course, the lips of Angelina Jolie, living dolls go disturbingly above and beyond to become Internet famous by modifying their bodies to look exactly like Barbie. Exactly. The most well known of the living dolls are beauty guru Dakota Rose and Russian model Anya. Anya has spend almost $1 million on plastic surgery. She has gotten her breasts, head, lips and even eyelids enlarged. She has also removed some of her ribs to create a thinner waist.

Beauty is pain, I guess.