Pupils have begun returning to school as lockdown restrictions were eased across England.
Outdoor markets and car showrooms have also started reopening, while the first horse racing event in months was being staged and pigeons took to the skies for a race over Yorkshire.
But in Watters' world, that's overdoing it—effeminate, even.
On Wednesday's broadcast of The Five, the conservative Fox host claimed:
"Men don’t wave simultaneously with both hands.”
“We wave with one hand, not both hands at the same time."
The show's co-host Greg Gutfeld went one further and said, smugly:
“Men don’t wave at all, Jesse.”
To which Watters declared:
"We salute."
Judge Judy Eye Roll GIFGiphy
Yes, this conversation happened on Fox News, and here's proof.
Honestly, are we surprised?
Watters also mocked Walz by referring to him as "Tampon Tim," a moniker Republicans used after the Minnesota governor signed a 2023 education law that included a mandate allowing public schools to provide free menstrual products to students from 4th through 12th grades.
The hashtag #TamponTim began circulating on the internet the day after Walz was officially named former Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris' VP pick in the 2024 election.
Watters laid out more rules of manhood, warning his fellow hosts that men should be "just funny" and "not that serious."
He continued:
“You don’t eat soup in public. You don’t cross your legs, and you don’t drink from a straw."
"And one of the reasons you don’t drink from a straw is because the way your lips purse. It is very effeminate."
"And [Walz’s] excuse was, ‘I was drinking a milkshake.’ Again, you shouldn’t be drinking a milkshake. Milkshakes are for kids.”
The internet wondered if Watters was okay.
Watters' masculinity rules came after Walz responded to Fox News criticizing him for drinking milkshakes using a straw.
He tweeted:
"There’s nothing weird about Jesse Waters secretly enjoying a bowl of soup alone in the dark."
Earlier this week on Gavin Newsom's podcast, Walz talked about Fox News' apparent misogyny and obsession with Walz's masculinity while he was on the 2024 campaign trail with Harris.
"We buy their frame on these issues of sexuality, you know, but their whole thing was is that they spent all their time, these guys on Fox News, [saying] that 'Walz is gay, he's not masculine, you know, he doesn't coach football the way he should," said Walz.
He continued:
"There's misogyny in here that's happening."
"Not that I spend much time thinking about this, and it just baffled me how much time they spent trying to attack me, that I wasn't, like, masculine enough in their vision."
The former high school football coach added:
"I saw Fox News did, like, a couple days because I used a straw, and I'm, like, 'Hell, man, what am I—how else do you drink a milkshake?' type of thing."
"But they focused on it obsessively, which I think again is their obsession, their weirdness."
Real men using both hands to wave may be "effeminate" by Watters' standards of masculinity, but this isn't?
Just sayin'.
But Trump is doing just that, having signed an executive order on Thursday directing Education Secretary Linda McMahon to begin dismantling the DOE—an apparent attempt to bypass Congressional approval, which is required to formally shut down a federal agency.
Speaking at a signing ceremony at the White House, Trump acknowledged that his administration may later seek Congressional approval to eliminate the department entirely, arguing that its budget had more than doubled in recent years without improvements in national test scores.
While the federal government does not dictate school curricula, as state and local governments control 90% of school funding, Trump reiterated his campaign pledge to "send education back to the states."
And Musk celebrated the move by posting a meme showing Trump kneeling and giving a peace sign at the grave of the hilariously misspelled "Education Departmen."
You can see his post below.
@elonmusk/X
A self-own for the ages.
The mockery was swift.
State officials and lawmakers have expressed concerns about their ability to fully take over education policy, and Trump’s latest directive is expected to face further legal challenges.
Labor and civil rights groups also condemned the move. National Education Association President Becky Pringle warned that the decision "will hurt all students" by increasing class sizes, slashing job training programs, making higher education less affordable, reducing special education services, and weakening student civil rights protections.
The DOE's budget primarily consists of federal grants and loan programs, including Title I funding ($18.4 billion) for high-poverty K-12 schools and the IDEA program ($15.5 billion) for students with disabilities.
Despite the executive order, the White House stated these programs—along with the $1.6 trillion federal student loan program—would remain unaffected. However, it remains unclear what spending cuts the administration can implement without touching these major initiatives.
This move follows previous efforts to weaken the department, including significant layoffs—reducing its workforce by nearly half—and the cancellation of multiple grants and contracts.
Unfortunately, some scam artists have fine tuned their game a bit more, making it a bit more difficult to detect.
In some cases, they've gotten so good at conning people out of their money, that they are hiding under the guise of a seemingly reputable industry.
Redditor OkraCharacter4588 was eager to learn about how people learned that certain business and industries were 100% fraudulent, leading them to ask:
"Redditors who unexpectedly discovered a 'modern scam' that's everywhere now - what made you realize 'Wait, this whole industry is a ripoff'?"
"Once upon a time, I attended a time-share presentation because they offered money to go."
"Yes, they are all high-pressure sales and scammy by nature, but on this one I spotted exactly how they were going to hose everyone involved."
"I read the contract carefully (since I was there anyway and it made their salesperson shut up while I read), and quietly buried near the bottom was a mandatory cleaning and maintenance fee about half the rent of a modest apartment at the time that could be adjusted by them, at any time, with no stated limits."
"Fortunately, they'd supplied a shuttle to pick up people and take them to the timeshare presentation location."
"There were about 15 of us in one of those little shuttle vans with seats that face each other."
"We started chatting on the way back, and I pointed the clause out to everyone in the group."- Terpsichorean_Wombat
"Don't know if this counts, but I found an empty lot with barely visible no parking signs next to an ATM."
"Tow trucks would wait just behind the building for someone to park there."
"The person would park and walk around the corner to use the ATM."
"Then return to their car and it was already hooked up and the tow truck driver would unhook it for a fee... conveniently able to be obtained from the ATM."
"You'll never guess how I learned of this scam."
"It's been years but I'm still enraged when I think of it."- cinnapear
"Furniture."
"My wife is a huge fan of home design shows especially one called Dream Home Makeover."
"That'll be important later."
"So anyways, one day she picks out a rug for our dining area."
"It's called The Janettte (yes, they name rugs) and we order it."
"It's something like $1500."
"When the rug arrives it has a label on the back that says The Samuel."
"I'm thinking we ordered the wrong thing so I Google the brand and 'The Samuel'."
"I find it on Wayfair for $300."
"This can't possibly be the same rug can it?"
"I take a chance and order it from Wayfair and when I have both in my possession I do a side by side."
"The EXACT same rug."
"Basically, these designer brands are buying stuff directly from vendors, changing the name, and charging 5x the price."
"Fast forward a few months."
"She finds a dining table on Studio McGees website (the folks who have the Dream Makeover show)."
"I do a Google reverse search on the picture of the table and find it on a random furniture store's website for 1/3 of the cost."
"Now I know these 'designers' are nothing but glorified resellers."- schaudhery
Loop Home GIF by Homepoet.deGiphy
"Worked a month as a pharmacy clerk."
"Health insurance price disparity is insane, especially on things like insulin."- shadesofbloos
"I had a 'job interview' with what you'd now call an MLM way before they entered the mainstream consciousness."
"The interviewer spent the while time talking all this hustle culture bullsh*t, talking about how hard you gotta work if you want to succeed, how it's all down to your network and you need to be a go-getter, you better earn that commission, and all that sh*t."
"Well, I'm a fiercely introverted person who wasn't very self-motivated at the time, so when I was called into the 1 on 1 with the interviewer I couldn't help myself, I told him I was a bad fit and the didn't sound like it was for me."
"To my surprise, his tone instantly flipped."
"He started talking about how it wasn't that hard, how you could work less and still make a good living, how generous the commission structure was at lower levels, so on."
"Exact opposite of his earlier vibe."
"And that flip, that's what made me realize it was a scam."
"They didn't care about my skills or my drive or my personality."
"Hard sell or soft touch, they'd do whatever, because all they wanted was for me to buy in."
"And though I didn't understand the whole scam, I knew that had to be a bad idea."
"That's the only interview I've ever walked out of partway through."- GrinningPariah
"Any form of roof installed solar that is not paid in full at the time of install."
"Specifically talking about 20-30 year solar 'leases' and even worse: 'Power Purchase Agreements'."
"Scammy scammy scams."
"They prey on people."
"They’ll lie and tell you it’s a great investment for your house that the next buyer will love."
"WRONGGGG couldn’t be more wrong."
"No buyer wants to take over the next 18 years of your solar lease."
"You’ll end up having to pay it all off at closing and GUESS WHAT it’s $50k+."
"Which is absurd because the panels should have cost less than $10k if you had gotten a real company to do it."
"Even worse: the systems are usually so poorly designed that they don’t even appreciably lower your electric bill."
"So $50k for nothing."
"Worse than nothing because you’ll have to spend more money taking them off any time you need to have work done on the roof."
"A decent chance too that the solar company that sold you that 20-30 year lease goes out of business and so there’s no one to talk to about your system but someone else bought the leases (but none of the service warranties) and you are still on the hook for the payments regardless of if it works or not, and if you stop paying they have a lien on your house."
"SCAM SCAM SCAM SCAM."
"STAY AWAY FROM 'PAYMENT-PLAN' SOLAR."
"Regular solar, that you pay in full up front: fine."
"Good, even."
"Payment plan solar: SCAM."- shinywtf
Solar Energy GIF by NexampGiphy
"The house-building industry."
"Bought a new house recently and they wanted me to use their preferred lender."
"Did some googling and the lender was a subsidiary of the home builder's parent company and , as usual, sold the loan to another bank almost immediately."
"This is common and your initial lender will usually have a cheap-to-them loan, which they will sell to another bank for a slightly high rate, so on and so forth."
"The builder must make a ton of money on selling the loan, because they offered me a 7% discount on the home price if I used their lending company."
"Did some research on the history of the property the development was built in and they purchased it 15 years ago from another company for around $50 million."
"Did some research and, you guessed it, that company, which is no longer in existence, was an old subsidiary of the home builder's parent company as well and they had purchased the 35 acres 25 years ago for only a few hundred thousand."
"Why did they sell it to themselves for a much higher rate 10 years later?"
"My guess is that they wanted to inflate the value of the land."
"During design, they asked if I wanted the upgraded ceiling fans for $1500 (3 fans total)."
"I looked up the exact same model at home Depot and the fans were $200 each."
"By default, the home came with baseboards with a lot of curves in the cross section, which is no longer in style."
"The upgrade, which is just a straight piece of wood, was an extra couple of thousand."
"By default, the house came with the flip lights switches, which again are not really in style."
"The rocker switches are, and they were a $1k upgrade."
"They cost the same at a home improvement store!"
"They were offering some things as costly upgrades even though they didn't actually cost more to make, simply using outdated trends as the default in order to push the buyer to spend more money."- soap22
"Mobile gaming."
"It's been like this for probably a decade now that mobile gaming is just psychologically designed to give you just enough satisfaction at first, but keep you wanting more and locking stuff behind paywalls or extremely long timers."
"It's near impossible to get where you want without dumping money for in game currency and stuff."
"Mobile games are designed to the core to be addictive and siphon money from people."
"So many people still play them."
"I can't touch them anymore and haven't for years."- PM_ME_HAIRY_HOLES
"This is a little niche, but it fits."
"Part of your car is the suspension shock absorber; usually one per wheel."
"It works by moving a piston with some holes in it through an oil-filled cylinder."
"One end is attached to the chassis, the other end to the suspension."
"If you go to your car and 'bounce' the fender (so the chassis moves down, compressing the spring) the chassis will usually move up and down about one and a half times."
"It is the shock that slows it down."
"If the shock is broken, the suspension will bounce multiple times until friction in the pivots finally bleed off the energy."
"In a racing context, the shock has a lot of influence on handling, and what matters is the force curve the shock produces as it is cycled."
"That curve must be matched to the suspension to produce maximum grip."
"I’m simplifying a lot - I actually wrote a book that goes into much more detail - I’m trying to keep this easy without disappearing down a tech rabbit hole."
"Racing shocks can get very expensive, but most manufacturers don’t actually tell you the curve the shock makes."
"So I got a “shock dyno”, which is a device that measures shocks and provides the curve."
"And I started dynoing shocks."
"What I discovered was a litany of horror."
"Aside from a couple of reputable brands, most shocks were complete garbage."
"And I don’t mean 'they made the wrong curve' - that’s more of a tuning issue."
"I mean things like four shocks with the same part number - supposedly identical - producing four wildly different curves."
"Adjusters that did nothing, or worked backwards, or controlled the opposite of what they were supposed to do."
"One set of very expensive Super Tuna 'magic' shocks had one of the pistons installed upside-down."
"I shared this info far and wide… and nobody cared."
"People still spend money on absolute junk because 'if it is a racing part and it’s expensive, it must be good!'”- NorthStarZero
"When I saw my first crypto rug pull."
"That's when I realized that most of the industry is a giant casino, and it's all about who can time when to get out of the coin the best."
"Very few coins offer any real utility, and no one's using most of them for anything legitimate."
"Most of it is just to move money across borders without the banks and governments seeing it."- shotsallover
"For profit university was running a recruitment company."
"They would give you a list of jobs you were 'almost' qualified for, then offer classes and certification to get the jobs."
They were all thousands of dollars for a few hours of training in docketing software or something similar."
"Later that school was bought out by the University of Phoenix."- DeLaRey
"Like a decade ago Reddit was big on safety razors, the old fashioned twisty open thing you out a single blade into like what your grandpa might have used."
"Eventually I tried it out because of this."
"I now spend less on shaving per year than I used to spend on a pack of razors for like a week or two."
"Blah blah plastics lobbies and advertising convincing us to consume plastic etc."
"I wish I knew more money-saving things like this."
"The ROI is damn near instant."- driftingfornow
Shave Shaving GIF by Shawn MendesGiphy
"Anyone remember that whole Honey thing from just like... a month or two ago?"
"Well... that made me realize that whole thing was a load of bs."- UrMomsSweetA**
"I'm not sure why modern nursing care facilities/homes are not higher on the list."
"Some are good (but they're 10k/month or more) but most others, sh*t."
"Not to mention they drain older citizens' savings until they have nothing left, then push them to Medicare and then bill the government at a higher cost due to the 'extra' work involved in using that system."
"Total scam, that's making some of the larger corp's that own hundreds of these little out-of-the-way homes billions each year."- op4
"Most glasses, esp ones you can get at an eye doctor.. one can get frames & lenses online for like $30."
"There's a big monopoly company that jacks up the prices in most brick and mortar stores."- Erlian
The Sandlot Wow GIFGiphy
The easiest things to miss are almost always hiding in plain sight.
Sometimes at an irrevocable price.
