Viral

Some Chinese officials have rolled out a whole new way to test for COVID-19 -- and it entails bending over and spreading 'em ... something we can now see in a test run.

You might've heard of this by now, but you haven't seen it quite like this -- check out this video of a Chinese health official demonstrating how their new anal swabbing method works ... doing the deed on none other than a life-size dummy, who is oh-so-compromised.

The doll -- which is weirdly wearing pajamas for some reason -- is bent over with its heinie out in the air and its arms spread out, almost like it was getting checked for weapons at a prison intake session or something. Eventually, the scientist goes in.

The guy dips the swab in a saline solution -- standard practice for this methodology -- and then inserts the cotton-end into the hole. He gets in there pretty deep -- an inch or so give best results, they say -- and then gives it a nice little twist for good measure before pulling out and putting in a plastic sample tube.

No big, right?!? Eh, not exactly ...

While some Chinese experts insist the anal swab test is much more accurate at detecting the 'rona -- a lot of people aren't too happy about the surprise screenings they're being subjected to at airports in parts of northern China, including in the country's capital of Beijing.

Word is this is NOT a country-wide mandated test, but it seems like some provinces and whatnot are running it on their own terms as they see fit -- and folks don't appear to have much of a say in the matter. If they suspect someone's exposed, they can request it.

They can either administer it to you on the spot, or they'll let you keep your dignity and sometimes let you do a self-test in the privacy of a room, before they cut you loose.

GameStop's wild stock market ride is all the rage in the investment world, but to employees at the brick-and-mortar stores ... it's had little impact on their workday, unless they happen to work in Cleveland.

TMZ reached out to GameStop locations in 20 major U.S. cities to see if they've seen an increase in customers due to the frenzy caused by the WallStreetBets group on Reddit.

Sixteen stores -- including those in Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit, Dallas, Houston, Memphis, Nashville, Portland, Phoenix, Seattle, San Fran and San Diego -- said it was status quo as far as customers.

One thing hedge fund managers, and even WallStreetBets founder Jaime Rogozinski, agree on is GameStop's future isn't bright. Hell, 3 stores -- in Miami, Philly and NYC -- told us biz has been slower than usual. Miami had a whopping 8 customers Thursday.

However, Cleveland is the exception, where they say sales are up 100% compared to last week. We're told several customers at that branch credited the stock surge story for inspiring them to visit and support GameStop ... so it doesn't go under.

On the flip side ... the manager of a Minneapolis location tells us he got an angry call from someone upset they couldn't trade GameStop shares on Robinhood.

As we've reported ... the stock-buying frenzy of GameStop, AMC, BlackBerry and a handful of other companies resulted in Robinhood shutting down trading for them, which pissed off retail investors who believe the move only benefits hedge funds.

Brian Williams put his dry-wit on full display to troll House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy's meeting with Donald Trump -- and viewers never saw it coming.

The longtime anchor teed up the gag by earnestly telling his guests -- Baratunde Thurston and Bill Kristol -- that he'd obtained exclusive video of the highly criticized Thursday meeting between Rep. McCarthy and Trump at Mar-a-Lago.

What he ended up rolling, though ... was an iconic clip from the Oscar-nominated film, "Jerry Maguire."

The clip alone would've been funny, given the context, but Williams -- who clearly has late-night talk aspirations -- continued to sell the joke with his deadpan style ... claiming he thought it was going to be a vid of the meeting, and "someone’s gonna be, of course, in big trouble."

Trouble is a good word to describe how many anti-Trump folks feel about the Mar-a-Lago meeting between the former President and the House Minority Leader.

McCarthy's taking heat because 2 weeks ago he criticized Trump for inciting the Capitol riots, but now appears eager to work with him -- a sign Trump still has major power with the GOP.

Ben Crump -- the famed civil rights attorney who represents the families of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd -- has been retained to represent the family of the Florida HS teen seen on video being body slammed by a cop.

The family of Taylor Bracey -- the 16-year-old Liberty HS student slammed to the concrete by school resource officer Ethan Fournier -- hired Crump just days after the attorney called out the "brutality" of the Osceola County Sheriff's Deputy, who has since been placed on paid administrative leave while the department investigates.

Crump says Taylor was unarmed and posed no threat to the officer ... adding the officer did not render any aid and instead handcuffed her as she lay unconscious.

He said, "It is unconscionable what happened to this young girl at the hands of someone whose primary duty is to serve and protect our children." He added, "Do we really need to add school resource officers to the list of fears they deal with on a daily basis?"

Crump wants the deputy fired and arrested. As we reported ... the Sheriff's Dept. said it's turning the case over to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

One might say Mark Cuban's got a baby shark on his hands -- his 11-year-old son got in on the Robinhood craze, but in just one day he learned some tough lessons.

The "Shark Tank" star joined us on "TMZ Live" Thursday and told us all about his fam's newest trader, Jake, who was flying high Wednesday, when he opened his Robinhood account and picked up a couple shares of AMC and BlackBerry.

Mark says Jake was riding high as he turned his first trades into seemingly easy money -- but like millions of investors, Thursday morning turned into a learning experience for him.

Pop had to break it down for Jake -- what goes up sometimes comes way down. Like, way down.

Fortunately for Jake, his father is a billionaire, so this lesson won't cost him everything -- he only invested about $100, anyway. But, watch the clip ... Mark taught his son something else about how to react when a stock you like suddenly plummets.

Stock school aside, Jake is ticked off about Robinhood shutting down trades -- and Mark told us why the free-trading app has some explaining to do.

The GameStop stock battle between retail investors and hedge fund managers has resulted in Robinhood unlisting the stock and several others ... and people are pissed.

As of Thursday morning ... Robinhood customers can no longer buy Gamestop stock on the free-trading app, thereby blocking members of the WallStreetBets forum on Reddit. Of course, that group of investors sparked the resurgence of GameStop's stock.

It also aimed to do the same for AMC, Nokia, BlackBerry, Naked Brands and a few other stocks ... but Robinhood's unlisted those too!

In making the move, Robinhood emailed customers warning of "the current volatile market conditions." The notice stated, "It’s as important as ever to be an informed investor," and included links to its investment resources.

Of course, this has infuriated customers who believe this is market manipulation favoring the hedge funds that have shorted stocks like GameStop... and hurting retail investors who are backing them.

As one person on Twitter put it ... "The free market is only free until rich people lose money."

As we reported, GameStop's stock price has surged to $350 this week -- after starting the year at $19 -- thanks to the backing of retail investors encouraged by the WallStreetBets group.

By Robinhood blocking trading on Thursday, the general feeling among the public is that the financial services company is siding with the hedge fund people on Wall Street ... and screwing over the little guy.

This could get ugly.

A man with a major investment in BlackBerry options claims his finances are taking a dive due to Robinhood halting trading on his stock ... a move he believes was made to protect Wall Street's hedge fund bros.

Richard Joseph Gatz of Illinois is going after the financial services company, after it stopped allowing individuals to buy stock in companies at the center of the current battle between Reddit investors and hedge fund managers ... including GameStop, AMC, BlackBerry and Nokia.

According to the legal docs -- obtained by TMZ -- Gatz says he owned 2 option contracts for BB, and when trading was halted Wednesday night he claims the value of those options decreased by nearly 200 percent.

Gatz claims the halt of retail trading for these stocks has caused irreparable harm to his bottom line, and accuses Robinhood of manipulating the market so that he's "unable to get fair market value for his options."

According to the docs, Gatz alleges Robinhood made the move "to protect institutional investment at the detriment of retail customers." He's suing for big damages.

As we reported, Robinhood's trading halt amid the GameStop stock surge has pissed off customers who believe it's siding with the Wall Street establishment -- i.e. hedge fund managers -- and screwing the little guy.

A school resource officer used a Taser on a female student who cops say was involved in a fight with another student, and severely resisted when the officer got involved.

According to the police report ... the cop approached the girl as she was going after a male student in the cafeteria of Eustis High School in Central Florida. The cop says he tried to stop her, but she attacked him by punching him several times in the head.

The deputy claims he tried to talk her down, but it didn't work and she allegedly punched him in the face. Videos shared on TikTok show the violent struggle the cop had with the student as he tried to restrain her.

The deputy says he warned her he was going to Tase her if she didn't stop resisting. When she ignored that, he fired the Taser and she went down hard.

The girl was transported to the Lake County Jail without further incident, and later released to her guardian on home detention.

The Lake County Sheriff's Office tells us ... the deputy documented at least 18 strikes he took from the student before he fired his Taser. We're told the use of force was reviewed, and the officer was found to have acted lawfully and within agency policy.

This is the second disturbing video to come out of Florida this week in which a school resource officer's seen using force on a Black female student.

As we reported ... the Osceola County Sheriff's Office announced Wednesday that their deputy who body-slammed a female high school student is on administrative paid leave pending an investigation.

The students of Liberty High -- where a teen was body-slammed by a resource officer -- say the cop has no business being on campus anymore, because he's a menace.

Students at the Florida school tell us ... the sentiment among classmates is pretty much universal ... Officer Ethan Fournier must be fired -- or at the very least, permanently removed from duty at Liberty.

We're told lots of the kids no longer trust campus cops and they feel their safety is in jeopardy. We're hearing some students and their families are considering transferring out because of the incident ... that's how rattled everyone is.

Take senior Trey'vion Telfair ... who tells TMZ he used to think Officer Fournier was a good guy. He says Fournier participated in police brutality seminars for Liberty's Black Student Union back in September, and seemed genuine ... saying he stood with them.

Telfair now thinks it was all an act. Ditto for junior Daijah Watts, who says she remembers Fournier as a relatively chill dude ... but does recall one time when he allegedly went too far.

Watts claims she saw Fournier use pepper spray on a group of kids who were fighting 2 years ago. She now thinks the whole department is suspicious. Speaking of Liberty brass, we're told the school's offered up mental health resources for their kids and teachers alike ... making school psychologists, counselors and social workers available to anyone who needs to talk.

An Idaho woman showed up to a city council meeting dressed in what she described as Muslim attire, as an example of the lengths she says she goes to just to avoid wearing a mask.

This went down Monday in the city of Lewiston, where council members opened the meeting with public comments ... which brought forth a throng of angry citizens, many of whom were griping about local mask mandates and restaurant shutdowns, claiming it was illegal.

Eventually, this woman -- who ID'd herself as Katie Dugger -- stepped up to the podium ... wearing a bright purple headdress that she later said she got in Peru, but apparently used in public to get out of putting on face covering.

Watch for yourself ... it's bonkers. Basically, Dugger says in order for her to go to school in-person, this is what she has to wear to get by without any hassle, passing herself off as a Muslim. She even wraps the fabric around her face like a burka, to bring her point home.

She isn't using the religious liberty argument ... she claims her aversion to mask-wearing is all about childhood trauma 🤷🏽‍♂️.

Shaun Weiss -- famous for playing Goldberg in "The Mighty Ducks" -- is damn near unrecognizable again, but in a great way ... and that's because he's now 1-year sober.

His friend, Drew Gallagher, tells TMZ ... Shaun officially hit the milestone yesterday. He says Shaun chose to delay his Christmas as part of the celebration ... waiting to open presents on the day he celebrated his sobriety.

There's more good news ... remember the full dental sponsorship he got back in September to address his need for new teeth? Well, his permanent pearly whites -- top and bottom -- are almost done. He's wearing temporary dentures for now.

Shaun, who is still at a sober living house in Tarzana, CA, is getting ready for his next steps in life. We're told he's working on his comedy chops and doing some scriptwriting.

GameStop's wild ride on the stock market is still going strong, as one of the crazier Wall St. stories continues to stun hedge fund managers ... to the delight of Reddit investors.

The video game retailer's stock price has surged Wednesday -- it's up more than $220 for the day, and is approaching $400 -- thanks to a group of traders belonging to the Reddit message board, WallStreetBets.

Here's what's going on, in layman's terms -- the Reddit investors basically decided to make GameStop Corp. (GME) their main stock market focus, buying up as many shares as possible in order to screw over hedge funds that have shorted the stock ... meaning they bet against it.

So, the Redditors have been encouraging everyday investors -- called retail investors -- to buy up GME stock to increase its price and, as a result, the hedge funds are getting screwed.

Elon Musk, who's had battles with hedge funds shorting Tesla in the past, joined the troll job -- that's what hedge fund managers see this as -- by tweeting a link to the Reddit message board behind the GameStop action.

All of it has been working -- GameStop began the year at $19, reached the $90 mark earlier in the week ... and it just got much closer to $400 in the time it took to write this article.

Meanwhile ... hedge funds that shorted GME are losing tons of money.

What a day on Wall Street!!!

Florida cops are feeling the heat over that video of a deputy's assault on a female high school student ... so much so, they're addressing the case in a news conference.

The Osceola County Sheriff's Office will discuss the case Wednesday morning after the horrific incident at Liberty High School Tuesday afternoon. Video showed a resource officer violently restraining a female student, and throwing her onto the ground ... head first.

In the video, you see the teenager hit the concrete hard, and her body goes limp. The officer proceeds to place handcuffs on her as the crowd around screams. Multiple people appeared to be recording, and caught the action from different angles. It looked like the student lost consciousness.

The only thing we've heard from OCSO thus far is that the officer was breaking up a fight, and that an investigation is underway.

Presumably, Sheriff Marcos Lopez -- who'll be at the podium shortly -- will have some sort of update on what they've learned at this point, and whether the officer will face any repercussions. It'll be interesting to hear if he denounces the act, or tries to justify it.

Several people have accused the officer of excessive force, with some supposed eyewitnesses claiming the girl was already under control and separated when the cop did what he did. Unclear how the student is doing, or what her condition is.

A violent video of a cop slamming a female student to the ground and seemingly knocking her unconscious is raising serious questions about the level of force used here.

The video was shot Tuesday at Liberty High School in Osceola, Florida. You can see a young woman -- allegedly a student -- with her hands behind her back as a deputy slams her to the ground. There was a loud bang as the girl's head slammed to the concrete, and she appears to be immediately out cold.

It's unclear why the Osceola Sheriff's deputy was at the school or what led up to the deputy's involvement. The Sheriff's Dept. would only tell us the incident is under investigation.

One person who posted the video said, "This girl was already separated and under control by one of the faculty members when the officer came out of nowhere, picked her up and bodyslammed her headfirst on to the concert."

We've also reached out to Liberty High ... so far, no word back.

We're getting some behind-the-scenes from President Biden's Inauguration courtesy of Amanda Gorman ... who got some scoop on what was going down between the Obamas.

The poet laureate -- who went viral on Inauguration Day for her rousing piece, 'The Hill We Climb' -- dished to Ellen DeGeneres about being in the company of some huge names on that stage.

Amanda says her mom might've been a little more star-struck than she was ... especially for J Lo and A-Rod. But, as far as hanging with former Presidents and First Ladies, it's clear Amanda's a vet.

Anyway, check out what Amanda says Barack was doing behind the lectern that apparently ticked off Michelle enough for her to say something about it ... multiple times.

It's hilarious, and very relevant for the times. Let's just say Michelle was concerned about the former President's COVID-safety.

Amanda says Michelle had to rein him in, but the more telling thing here is how close Amanda was to the action and how tight she is with the Obamas.

Mike Lindell, CEO of MyPillow, is just like his pal, Donald Trump -- Twitter's permanently banned him for continuing to push the baseless claim Trump won the election.

Twitter says it decided to pull the plug on the "MyPillow Guy's" account "due to repeated violations of our Civic Integrity Policy" ... according to a spokesperson.

The Twitter policy was put in place in September to combat misinformation -- specifically about the election -- and has primarily been used since the January 6 Capitol riots as the basis for permanently suspending people.

It's unclear which of Lindell's tweets was the final straw, but he's continued to claim the election was rigged, even after President Biden's inauguration.

His allegations also led to his MyPillow products being pulled from shelves at Bed Bath & Beyond earlier this month. Shortly after the attack on the U.S Capitol, Lindell called it "very peaceful" and blamed the mayhem on "undercover Antifa" ... while continuing to voice support for Trump and insist he'd remain President for 4 more years.

As he left office, Trump vowed he'd be back in some form -- though clearly not on Twitter. His MyPillow BFF might have to follow in his footsteps.