Ode to memes

There is so, so much to love about terrible Internet memes. The faux inspiration, the passive aggressive insults targeted at no one in particular, the fishing lines of self-affirmation, the rally cry of pointing out super obvious things, and the inexplicable use of non-copyrighted cartoon characters as the mouthpiece by which to do so. Tweety Bird thinks you’re a crazy aunt but that’s OK? Sure, why not.

But my favorite aspect of terrible memes is the bafflingly consistent use of awful grammar. Like, a meme only has a handful of words, typically in a humongous font, yet there are always grammatical errors. I mean, no one can proofread these?

AIN’T NOBODY GOT TIME FOR THAT—GOTTA GET THIS BABY OUT THERE! Click

Click-CLICK

(I have blue eyes btw, if you've always been wondering why I'm so dang kind-hearted and always looking out for other.)

The punctuation, syntax, misuse of possessives, straight misspellings and—my favorite—utterly random capitalization, combined with the general pointlessness of the entire message, make for a thing of beauty and wonder. As does the fact that these memes are shared, liked and commented on—UNIRONICALLY— by literally tens of thousands of the strangest Facebook addicts with the oddest FB handles (Bobb & Martha justtryingtogetby w/LOVE jONES).

I’ve been posting these memes for a while now, and I’m never dissuaded by the fact that lots of people (relative to the amount of people who read this blog, so like four people?) don’t understand why. Sometimes when I share them to the book/blog’s FB page, and the meme itself shows up on the preview, an aunt or distant cousin or a friend of my parents will like it thinking I was sharing the meme. This gives me even more motivation. Can’t stop, won’t stop.

ANYWAY, I came across this one the other day and, quite frankly, I fell in love. It’s not by any stretch the greatest one I’ve ever seen (which remains this), but there’s something about it that makes it special. I’m going to leave it here so that you might bask in its goodness. I’d be remiss were I not to give a shout out to Dave (assuming) of Daveswordsofwisdom.com, without whom we’d never know things like “sons are nice” and it’s OK to love yourself just the way you are. And a big shout-out to Liza Adams and the seven-nation army that supports her counterpoint. All in all, this is a pinnacle of human discourse.