Julian Jensen/Howard Thurman Center/Screenshot by CNET

On a day where Aaron Sorkin encouraged newly elected Democrats to "stop acting like young people", Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez had a different plan: She jumped onto a Donkey Kong Twitch livestream and talked about how much she loved the Nintendo 64.

Where do we start with this?

First off some background on the livestream itself.

On Sunday Harry Brewis -- better known as H.Bomberguy, a YouTuber and Twitch streamer -- put together a livestream to raise money for Mermaids, a charity that provides support for gender diverse and transgender children. At time of writing he's raised over $255,000 by playing Donkey Kong 64. (Update: the livestream is now finished and H.Bomberguy raised over #340,000.) Part of the reason for the livestream was in response to Graham Linehan, the creator of Black Books and The IT Crowd. Recently Linehan has become extremely outspoken on transgender issues.

Folks, In the same way that you don’t tell anorexic kids they need liposuction, you don’t tell vulnerable kids with feelings of dysphoria that they need surgery and drugs. You certainly don't tell them fairy stories about being "born in the wrong body". — Graham Linehan (@Glinner) January 20, 2019

H.Bomberguy chose the Mermaids specifically, he says, because Linehan began a campaign against the charity, after it received a £500,000 (around $643,000) donation from the UK National Lottery.

The charity has raised a huge amount of attention online and a lot of money in the process.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is the newly elected U.S. Representative for New York's 14th congressional district who's been hitting headlines for her politics and her dancing. At some point today, she caught wind of the livestream and put it out on her Twitter account.

If you’d like to use this as a good moment to support the queer community, there’s a charity twitch stream going on for @Mermaids_Gender: https://t.co/vCvvqRhAwb — Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 20, 2019

And that tweet in itself came about after Aaron Sorkin openly criticised newly elected democrats for focusing on issues like "transgender bathrooms", an issue which Sorkin called a "a Republican talking point they're trying to distract you with".

But then Ocasio-Cortez took things one step further and called into the livestream.

dude, @AOC called into a Twitch stream tonight pic.twitter.com/KNxSWt2kzB — Alex Thomas (@AlexThomasDC) January 20, 2019

And then began waxing lyrical about her love of the Nintendo 64 and name checked games like Super Mario 64 and Pokemon Snap.

Here’s @aoc talking about how Nintendo 64 was the best system. She’s on @twitch helping to raise money for trans kids. pic.twitter.com/cJIfUif1mv — New Super Blood Wolf Moon Bros. U Deluxe (@GenePark) January 20, 2019

The online response was instantaneous.

aaron sorkin blathering about gravitas while aoc joins a twitch stream for trans rights is... pic.twitter.com/HakeuRqngy — Talia Lavin (@chick_in_kiev) January 20, 2019

aoc saying "donkey kong 64 is outside of my wheelhouse" is exactly how elected officials should engage with any sort of Hip New Thing they don't know about — Colin Spacetwinks (@spacetwinks) January 20, 2019

Bloody hell @AOC is a genius. Supporting trans rights on a video game livestream is something that will hit bang on with young voters while her boomer critics won’t even be able to understand what’s happening, much less know how to criticise it. https://t.co/Spi0xkvjKU — David Rayfield (@RaygunBrown) January 20, 2019

There are 2 things that people really like about @AOC: she has bold, uncompromising political ideas; and she tries to meet people wherever they are (Twitter, Instagram, protests, community meetings, Twitch streams) to talk to people about those ideas. — Peter Sterne (@petersterne) January 20, 2019

Regardless of where you sit, it's interesting to watch this play out. Ocasio-Cortez has essentially used controversy around her online persona to raise money for children in need. She's literally turned a negative into a positive and helped support an oppressed minority in the process.

Personally, I'm interested in where Ocasio-Cortez stands on the Nintendo GameCube.

Updated Jan. 21 12:56 p.m. PT: Added the final amount raised in the charity livestream.

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