Way back in 2015, one of the top Aussie internet dramas was a viral post on Coles’ Facebook page. It was about, of all things, the common herb marjoram.
Maybe you’ve used marjoram in recipes before. If not, it’s described as a perennial herb with citrus/sweet pine flavours, not dissimilar to oregano. While it’s not as commonly used as oregano, it’s definitely common in supermarkets.
Which is why it was so wild when a supposed shopper, Andrew Onorato, took to Facebook with this rant:
The comments section went off – wildly, it was a mix of fellow outraged folks and people who could not handle the chaotic energy of someone thinking Coles was just casually selling marijuana in their herb aisles. But according to Mamamia who wrote about it at the time, there were literally people convinced the guy had uncovered some very public drug network inside a national supermarket chain.
Now, in 2020, when we have a President in the United States who tweets conspiracy theories as truth and encourages the injection of disinfectant to cure COVID-19, it’s not that surprising that a post like this went nuts online, I guess.
At the time, Coles declined to comment and simply deleted the post. Maybe they suspected, as others did, that the post was actually some clever shitposting.
A Reddit thread from 2018 certainly had people thinking the “marjorama” complaint wasn’t, in fact, a crazy boomer but was someone, in true Aussie form, just taking the piss.
“This sort of post is often made on Aussie facebook pages. 100% confident it’s meant to be a joke,” one Redditor wrote.
Another person who has since deleted their account claimed their mate did it.
‘”tis a friend, can confirm ‘tis a jest, can confirm aussies are some of the biggest shittalkers.”
My take? Having since seen plenty of shitposting online, this reeks of a clever guy who saw a funny opportunity and took it. But at the time, I was completely convinced this was some pearl-clutching Aussie lamenting the crumbling of society, who snapped at the sight of what he assumed was marijuana in a supermarket aisle. What’s the world coming to, old man yells at cloud style.
Whatever the truth is behind the post, it was fucking funny at the time and it still makes me laugh today.
We’ll never look at marjoram the same way again.
