Yes, I know. RIP journalism, etc.

During my morning trawl through the internet, I came across a story that captivated my attention like nothing has ever done before. There exists a woman called Megan McKenna and there is a lot of confusion surrounding how many toes she possesses. Jackpot, I know. If you're in the same position as I was roughly twenty minutes ago, you'll be wondering who Megan McKenna is. She was on Britain's Got Talent, TOWIE, Ex On The Beach, Celebrity Big Brother and is also a country music singer. Now that that's out of the way, we need to talk about her toes. Last year, Megan had to deny claims that she had six toes on each foot. It's a standard accusation that most celebrities have had to deal with at some stage in their career, and she carried it out with great dignity and a very high level of professionalism. The allegations surfaced due to the following image, which has since been deleted, cropped and re-uploaded to Megan's Instagram without the toes. At the risk of seeming as though I'm playing devil's advocate, I must admit that I can absolutely see six toes on Megan's left foot. Or at least the outline of six toes. While only four actual toes are visible in the original image, it's the bone structure that's creating the illusion of a sixth toe on the end. There are a number of factors at play here that are creating this trick of the mind. There's a heavy filter distorting the colouring in the image, Megan's foot is in an unnatural position as it's balancing her entire weight on the couch and the couch appears to be quite soft, so it's creating a large indentation. There's no way to accurately assess the amount of toes Megan possesses with such a poor quality image. But that didn't stop the trolls, as they bombarded Megan's comment section with insults such as 'You have six toes' and 'Ew', presumably. (I can't verify the comments because she's deleted the original post, but those are my best and most polite guesses). As any one of us would do in that particular situation, Megan uploaded a heartfelt video to dispel the rumours. https://www.instagram.com/p/BQwKzozhQoW/?hl=en&taken-by=megan_mckenna_ Conspiracists will note that we never actually see that the feet shown are attached to Megan McKenna herself. As she turns the camera to pan down to her toes, it's plausible that an actor then stepped in and Megan filmed his/her toes from a deceptive vantage point. It's undeniable that there are ten toes on those feet, but are they definitely Megan's? Either way, she had some heated words to say.

"It's a bit worrying that people are so interested and send me abusive messages and tweets and Instagram posts, but then I've got to put into consideration that you guys that are messaging me that shit are lowlife scum"

Doth the lady protest too much? Or is she genuinely appalled at this admittedly ridiculous situation that she finds herself in? Put yourself into the custom-made shoes of someone that has six toes on one foot. If you were about to be uncovered as a six-toed individual, wouldn't you act in the exact same way that Megan is? On the other foot, wouldn't you act in the exact same way if you had a standard five-toed foot? It's a lose-lose situation and the trolls knew it. Megan was clearly rattled by the entire debacle as she didn't show her bare toes on Instagram for a whopping 18 days after the uproar. https://www.instagram.com/p/BReSDVIB1L6/?hl=en&taken-by=megan_mckenna_ Skeptics might notice that again, we're only seeing Megan's left foot, but it undeniably has five toes. Does her right foot tell another tale? Or does her go-to pose incidentally always involve cropping out her right foot for reasons that are none of our business? These are questions I cannot answer. It's entirely possible that the above image has been Photoshopped. Celebrities are forever getting caught meddling with their Instagrams in a bid to look perfect, when in reality, it's their imperfections that make us more drawn to them. Knowing that our idols have flaws, just like you and I, is part of their appeal. Regardless of any logic whatsoever, the trolls persisted. Despite Megan blatantly possessing five toes in the photograph, she was accused of lying and doctoring the image. It wasn't until another two months and nine days later that we got to see Megan's bare feet again. The woman was very clearly rattled and determined to deny the trolls any further opportunities of being hurtful. Again, the right foot is obstructed from view, but a quick zoom allows us to verify that there are indeed five toes on Megan's left foot. That is undeniable. Between the above image being uploaded and the ten months that have passed until now, Megan has been Instagrammed with her bare feet in clear view a total of zero times. She's bottled it. Megan has given up trying to prove to the skeptics that she has the normal amount of toes. However, in the interim, she released a song. The song is called 'High Heeled Shoes'. Coincidence? No. It's a very clear message to her haters. If you're going to make fun of my toes, I will wear shoes, but they won't just be any old shoes. Oh no. They will be high heeled shoes. A quick look at the lyrics tells us everything we need to know about Megan's stance on #toegate.

"If you want to see the world the way I do Walk a mile in my high heeled shoes Walk a mile in my high heeled shoes"

This empowering song suggests that Megan is coping with the situation, but her Instagram feed's lack of tootsies proves quite the opposite. Her bare feet haven't graced Instagram since 19th May, 2017. Until yesterday, that is. Yes, my dudes. You see, Megan's boyfriend is none other than Muggy Mike from Love Island. And true to his name, Muggy Mike has uploaded a photograph of the pair enjoying their holiday in Barbados with Megan's feet visible for the first time in almost a year. https://www.instagram.com/p/BgwhNvxBMnf/?hl=en&taken-by=mike_thala The trolls have had a field day with this one. This time around, they're alleging that Megan has only got three toes on her left foot, half the amount they had previously accused her of having. The nonsense claim further highlights the utter stupidity that the internet so regularly produces, as does this article. Again, to play devil's advocate, I can actually see the basis of the rationale. But it's likely to be a combination of a poor image quality, bad camera angle, uneven lighting and an unfortunate positioning that has made it appear as though Megan is a few toes shy of the standard amount. So who do we believe? A bunch of "lowlife scum" that comment on famous peoples' Instagrams with a view to causing them distress, or the woman that owns the feet in question? Megan appeared on Lorraine earlier today and expressed her disapproval of the trolls' hurtful claims and how they've made her incredibly nervous about an upcoming that show she's doing, where she will appear in The Real Full Monty and bare all for charity. Distastefully, the director showed a shot of Megan's feet as she was speaking, which were covered by a pair of High Heeled Shoes™. It was a cruel image to cut to as Megan spoke about her insecurities, plus she had her shoes on so it achieved nothing with regards to putting the whole thing to bed. So how are we going to figure out how many toes Megan has? We need to go back many years ago, long before the allegations surfaced. We need concrete proof that Megan McKenna, a person whose existence I was blissfully unaware of until earlier today, has got precisely ten toes, as she has told us several times. I searched her Twitter account for any mentions of the word 'toes' or 'feet' before 20th February 2017. Luckily, I struck a goldmine. On 15th September 2015 at 3:29pm, a cool two years before we'd hear any controversy regarding Megan's toes, she tweeted the following. https://twitter.com/Megan_Mckenna_/status/643793657565458432 So that settles it then, Megan has got ten toes and she's also got ten fingers. Case closed.   *wakes up in the dead of night in a pool of sweat with heart palpitations* Unless they're not actually her body parts pictured above and she's been deceiving us all along? Oh fuck.