this post was submitted on 10 Nov 2023
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Is there a fundamental internet meme that has had such a major impact that it would have notable repercussions if it had somehow disappeared?

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[–] [email protected] 43 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Rickrolling, possibly.

Or yeet. I think modern culture might be noticeably different if we didn't have yeet.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Would love a world without rickrolling tbh. One of the jokes I never really got

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Man, I don't know why a random Rick Astley song replaced goatse, but I am so glad it did.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I'll agree to that for sure. A marked improvement

[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 year ago (1 children)

AYBABTU. It was one of the first "real" memes that grew organically. If youtube had existed back then, the creators would probably have been set for life off the views from that one video alone.

But back then, they did it for the lulz...

[–] [email protected] 45 points 1 year ago

Somehow this is the first time I've ever seen, "All Your Base Are Belong To Us" shortened that way and it left me thinking it was something even more arcane 😂

[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

I sometimes think back to when Loss was first posted. I was a teenager hanging out on Shacknews and Somethingawful. The memes started pouring out, people couldn't stop mocking it. Seemed kinda cruel to me, obviously the author was trying to share something personal and painful with his audience. But the internet was a cruel place. People just didn't give a fuck.

I remember thinking it'll blow over before too long. Boy howdy did I underestimate the internet.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

To be honest i discovered this meme no so long ago, but i feel like the message and resilience of it is kind of universal. Everyone understand whats's its essence, everyone can relate. I never though i would be the one to bring it up anywhere, but here i am, posting it, years after the original. And its still relevant!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I agree the internet is a cruel place but it's also an extremely human response to react to tragedy with comedy. If the comic didn't strike a chord with people in a very real way, I'm not sure people would still be finding ways to laugh at it. I mean, look at how many people cope with/joke about depression through memes. I don't think it's meant to be cruel, it's just a natural human reaction to hardship and the reason it's still around is because people do, in fact, give a very sad fuck.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Doge, it would make crytobros slightly less cringe (VERY slightly)

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

They’d still find a way

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (2 children)

LOLCats?

I'm thinking you have to go way back, something like lolcats, advice duck, ceiling cat, something where if you remove it from the equation meme culture just straight up does not develop, or does not develop the same way or at the same time.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Before LOLcats was Demotivational posters, which were just the generic motivational posters, but with a humorous twist. Motivational posters had a black border with text on the bottom, which made it easy to swap out in MS Paint with funny text back in the early Internet days. It was the first caption memes, which became even more popular when people started doing it with cute cat pics too.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

I still have a large folder of black boxes. One day they'll be worth something!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Ah remember Nyan cat :-D

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

The I Can Haz Cheeseburger? kickoff meme of the happy Russian Blue cat.

I wasted sooooo much time on ICHC and it was due to that memeified cat picture that started it all.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Probably the one we already removed. I'd tell you which I've but unfortunately I forgot.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Don't blame yourself, last month's Emergency Broadcast Test wiped it from everyone's memory.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Lightsaber kid? Mostly just because iirc he got bullied for it quite a bit.

Goatse or two girls one cup. Or lemon party.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

What would the world be like with out our brave Lord and savior a man and a jar

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Fucking wojacks. Disappearance of this cancer will bring significant benefit to me specifically because I wouldn't have to endure those ugly drawings. Fucking trollface was better than this hell.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Rage comics were better and were actually a modern form of Commedia dell'arte or Masked Theatre, in such that it used stock characters and so plot could be both meaningful but simple. Wojacks lack implied character and context, so story or character depth requires explanation which doesn't usually work as well with that form

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Wojacks soyjacks chuds chuddle and chad memes can be really funny

also humor is subjective what you may dislike someone else may like

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I am willing to sacrifice all five funny memes you are talking about, if it means I will not have to look at all the "I depicted you as this ugly undesirable wojak saying stupid things therefore I won" bullshit ever again.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Does it have to be an internet meme? Also does God count as a meme?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Meme was coined by Richard Dawkins in The Selfish Gene in 1976, and defined as the equivalent of a gene but for more abstract ideas (because the gene is ultimately just a unit of information as well). I don't remember for sure if religion is specifically an example he personally used, but if it's not it's very comfortably in the same vein.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Religion is a memeplex in Dawkins’s conception

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

Well if you're a time traveler, you'd want to remove the very first meme for maximum ripple effect, so prevent people from questioning Bielefeld.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

If Dat Boi had never appeared online, all those people might still be alive.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

I can't imagine the modern internet without Among Us

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Does Encyclopedia Dramatica count as an internet meme?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago