Let’s get this out of the way: J.D. Vance did not say he had sex with a couch.
The rumor began as a joke on X, when user @rickrudescalves tweeted on July 15: “can’t say for sure but he might be the first vp pick to have admitted in a ny times bestseller to f***ing an Inside-out latex glove shoved between two couch cushions (vance, hillbilly elegy, pp. 179-181).”
That the tweet appeared to be directly sourced from Vance’s memoir, Hillbilly Elegy, convinced many people that it was in fact true, but if they were to read pages 179 to 181, all they’d find is Vance talking about his time at Ohio State University.
And then, the internet did its thing:
The memes and jokes got so deeply embedded in social media that the Associated Press responded with a “fact check.”
And then the AP removed its story.
“The story, which did not go out on the wire to our customers, didn’t go through our standard editing process. We are looking into how that happened.”
But by publishing and removing the story, the outlet has arguably drawn more attention to the baseless social media rumour than it would have otherwise got – a phenomenon known as the “Streisand effect”.
Of course, having some fun on the internet with an admittedly untruthful rumor is a lot less terrifying than the truthful issues with JD Vance.
Vance makes actual comments about childless voters (with or without cats), which is just weird.
He espouses extreme views on gender and abortion, including opposing cases of rape or incest, and voted against ensuring access to IVF.
He thinks people in violent marriages shouldn’t get divorced.
He’s backed by Silicon Valley venture capitalist Peter Thiel, who seems to be making techno-fascist and incel-adjacent ideas seem cool and edgy. And while on X, Vance followed several weird white nationalists who glorify bodybuilding and fascism, while promoting the Great Replacement Theory.
It’s pretty difficult to discount the terrifying beliefs that Vance himself has espoused.