A Government Account's Tweet About Spring Break Went Over Very, Very Poorly

The #SpringBreakingBadly hashtag is, ironically enough, going badly.

Ah, Spring Break. The time of year when a college student's thoughts turn to flights of fancy and drinking enough to vomit the entirety of the contents of their stomach and then some. Truly, a bad decision-maker's Christmas.

In order to prevent Americans from having their lives ruined by things other than excessive consumption and venereal complications, the State Department's official @TravelGov Twitter account has been tweeting advice with the hashtag #SpringBreakingBadly.

Spring break travelers - Wouldnt think about doing it in the US? Then dont do it when you are in another country #springbreakingbadly

Most of it is pretty solid advice, albeit with all the subtlety of the PSAs that most children's shows were forced to air back in the 1990s.

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A tweet that went out on Tuesday, aimed at preventing people from becoming unwitting drug mules, was along those lines — good advice, but kind of weird and the target of many jokes along the lines of "...and the problem is?"

Somebody offered you a free trip abroad, but the free luggage they offered is lined with cocaine. Beware of these scams #springbreakingbadly

And then...well, and then today happened.

Regardless of the fact that it's actually pretty decent advice to be on your guard overseas, people took offense to the use of the classic 1-10 hotness rating scale. (Besides, Colin from Love Actually totally disproves the tweet.)

The poor staffers running the account — identified in the bio as Kaitlin and Alyssa — soon faced a flood of tweets expressing the verbal equivalent of a facepalm.

John Kerry, call your (social media) office #springbreakingbadly

And while they tried to defend themselves...

@gonicholasgo We made no mention of gender. This can happen to anyone unfortunately.

(Sometimes both missing the "joke" and forgetting the crucial period before the tweet while doing so...)

@AustinChristie @wfburchell19 exactly our point! because you have money, you may be targeted. #springbreakingbadly https://t.co/Z2n0ByP3KB

...people weren't prepared to stop mocking the account.

LOOK THESE GORGEOUS SLOVAK MODELS SAY IN THEIR COUNTRY I'M CONSIDERED EXTREMELY HANDSOME. I NEED THIS OK https://t.co/j2zf3IeU8u

Both satirizing the tweet...

State Dept: You're ugly and nobody likes you. Trust no one. #springbreakingbadly

And calling out the State Department for being tone deaf.

@TimHerrera @TravelGov since when does the State Department neg its own citizens?

In the end, @TravelGov apologized for the tweet and subsequently deleted it entirely.

So, yeah. Spring Break whoooooooooooooooo.

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