In an era where so-called brain rot content dominates a significant portion of social media, it is hard to not come across at least a handful of such posts daily where users weigh in on or even spar over absolutely unnecessary topics. For example, we could have easily gone through our whole lives without knowing the purpose of the embroidered stripes on towels. However, a curious X user decided to complicate things — for the entire humanity.

Towel Question Sparks Laughter Riot

Taking to his timeline, software engineer Nate McGrady recently posted a picture of a towel and asked his followers if they knew “What is the purpose of this part of a towel", referring to the two thick sewn lines running across the breadth of a grey towel, which he posted a picture of to clearly illustrate what he meant.

He expanded the original post by threading it with an additional tweet, saying, “I’m convinced that it only exists to shrink and make it impossible to fold the towel nicely, causing you to buy another towel." The tweet thread garnered massive attention, with nearly 91.3 million views, more than 4,55,000 likes, and at least 15,500 reposts. However, it was the comment section that left users in splits.

Social Media Reactions

While it appeared that most didn’t know what the specified part of a towel was called, users flooded the comment section with all sorts of wild theories, mostly humorous ones, regarding its purpose. “That is the face/butt delineation line," joked one user, reinforcing the popular notion that humans use differ

Another user weighed in with an equally ridiculous assertion, saying, “Racing stripes. It makes them dry faster." However, a reply by a different user, who essentially compared towels to tyres, left McGrady wondering if that was true. The comment in question read, “It’s a trend line. When your towel thins out to that level, it’s time to replace your towel. Mileage may vary."

Some users were able to correctly point out that the embroidered stripes are called dobby borders. “It’s called ‘The dobby border,’ and it reinforces the fabric, prevents fraying, adds a decorative touch, and helps with folding. It’s also less absorbent due to its tighter weave," said one of the users. Another person explained that the dobby border helps maintain the “structure" and “prevents curling", besides being decorative.

Ent parts of their towel to dry off their face and buttocks.