Psychologists, sociologists, anthropologists, and even real scientists, have been baffled by what appeared to be a sharp increase in deafness.

“I first noticed it in my neighborhood,” famous psychologist Sigmund Noodle said. “I would walk down the street and say hello to neighbors in their yards but over time they stopped replying. Of course, I immediately assumed it was because of unresolved Oedipal or Electra conflicts, but the rapid spread was shocking.”

Well known lothario, Biff Manly, also noted the trend.

“I was at the gym, and just finished a dozen reps at 350…it was a light workout day…and I said to the hot chick working out next to me, ‘Hey, howya doin?’ but she didn’t even like answer or nuthin. Babes just don’t ignore the Biff. I mean, what’s up with that?”

Funded by a $350 million grant, released before the DOGE vultures could kill it, a diverse, and multidisciplinary team of “scientists” paid themselves $349 million of the grant funds before their “big discovery.”

“It just hit me,” grant administrator Huma Noyd said. “I was working from our new vacation home in Malibu and my partner said something to me, and I reflexively pulled one of my AirPods out my ear and said, ‘I’m sorry, what did you say?’ Just like that I made a breakthrough! People aren’t going deaf, they’re just listening to stuff.”

Historians, who also claim the dubious distinction of being “social scientists,” pointed out that While MP3 players and earbuds have been around since the 1990s, the explosion in earbud deafness coincided with the introduction of wireless earbuds, and specifically, Apple AirPods.*

Unsurprisingly, social “scientists” don’t agree on the root cause of the earpod deafness pandemic.

“The root is not technological, it is social,” Noodle argues. “The problem is that most people would rather listen to just about anything than talk to another person.”

Using sociograms, and other dubious social science techniques, Sigmund Noodle traced the roots of earpod deafness back to the podcast Crime Junkie.

*No, meridian-street.com was not paid to endorse Apple products and we’re pretty fed up with pushing products for free.