Memes of Discrimination

     Memes. We look at them, laugh at them, share them. Some of us even make them and post them on sites such as 9gag and reddit. Urban dictionary offers several definitions of the term meme, but the most used and popular one is the one related to the internet culture – “an idea that is spread from blog to blog” (user to user, site to site, Facebook post to Facebook post, etc.)

     Being a frequent 9gag visitor, I had a lot of good laughs and  even learned a lot of new information from different parts of the world. However, after some time, I noticed that not all memes were just for fun – many of them were rather offensive – sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic, or just plain stupid and rude. The problem is that even those kinds of memes get voted up to the so called “hot page” (on 9gag, for example), which means that they become visible to all visitors. 

Another, even worse problem is the medium they are “distributed” by, namely humor. We know that humor and laughter are something we all have in common and something that connects people. And that is a good thing. But humor is also known to belittle things and people, by making fun of them, or by making an important issue seem funny and not as significant.

     As it seems that almost no one notices these dangerous “windows” of discrimination, I’ve chosen to present some of the worst (most ignorant, offensive, unacceptable) memes I’ve seen online. 

Gender

    When it comes to the question of gender, meme makers and users are quite “medieval” – women’s place is in the kitchen, while men should be as manly as possible, and not show any feelings what so ever.

(badideatshirts.com)

     The first meme trend I wish to address here is one that is, as it seems, in the process of dying out, luckily. The main idea is, as the name suggests, that women’s place in this world is exclusively in the kitchen and their sole purpose is to make a sandwich for the man of the house. 

Why it is dangerous: I don’t think that this needs much explaining. We’re living in the 21^st century, and long gone are the housewife ideals of 1950’s. If you want a sandwich in the modern era, you should make it yourself.

(weknowmemes.com)

Just to make sure that the sexist jokes never really die out, this meme’s “successor” can be found in the Yoga pants-meme, which is basically an almost pornographic fixation on female behinds in said pants. The pictures seldom include any other part of the body, thus objectifying women in a similar way commercials do, as discussed and proven in several lectures and videos by Jean Kilbourne.

     Another meme that I believe is misrepresenting women is the well-known Overly attached girlfriend. While it looks like a harmless joke directed towards the fact that there are some of us out there who get overly attached when in relationships, the problem is that this meme has no real male counterpart. Even though there is a meme called Overly attached boyfriend, it is not as close as popular as the former one.

 

(secretsofthefed.com )

Why it is dangerous: By pointing out that almost only girls get “overly attached”, this meme gives girls some of the characteristics not all of us have, such as being insecure, possessive, vengeful, and – most often – mentally unstable. 

     I wish to point out one more thing here, which is not so much a meme, but a concept highly connected with the meme-culture – the friendzone. Although the female users have long tried to prove that the friendzone isn’t something reserved for guys (in other words, that a girl can as easily be “friendzoned” by a guy)[1], the large amount of friendzone-memes mainly focus on pointing out that girls are heartless, cold, selfish bi***es. 

(funnymeme.com)

     When it comes to men, there aren’t as many offensive memes, if we don’t count the Scumbag Steve or Bad Luck Brian, which don’t really focus on the gender issue. One of the most popular memes is certainly the  Overly Manly Man-meme, which glorifies all of the extremely ”manly” things and characteristics. Even though I personally understood it as irony, which it might as well be, the thing that bothers me is the very concept of ”manly” pictured in these memes. And if we consider that these sites are mainly visited by the younger audience, the danger is evident. Instead of presenting new and progressive ideas, these memes (together with the sexist ones I already discussed) send us back to the times and social norms we never should go back to. 

(m.memegen.com)

     Homosexual and transgender issues don’t come up too often in the meme-community, which can be both good and bad. On one hand, that way they avoid being ridiculed as much as other issues, but on the other – it’s as if these issues and people don’t even exist. When they do get used in memes, it’s almost always in a negative context, especially when it comes to trans themes. Users express a high dose of ignorance and hatred, making memes such as the ones below.

Why it is dangerous: The lack of open-mindedness among these young people is alarming. One would expect that the younger generations would be more understanding and accepting towards diversity, but if these trends continue and expand, I’m afraid that the future will not be as bright as we imagine it to be.

(weknowmemes.com)

Race

     When it comes to the question of face, memes are similarly full of prejudice and at times highly offensive. Even some which, at first sight, don’t seem racist, but the quite opposite, are just that – as long as your meme supports any kind of narrow minded or old-fashioned views, you are dealing with racism.

(blogcdn.com)

First of them, and also one of the most popular, is the so called HighExpectations Asian Father. Although it seems that this meme is harmless, since it is just “stating the obvious” – Asians are, “as we all know it”, competitive and smart. Yeah, right. First of all, have any of us met all of the Asian people? I doubt it. Thus, there we have a prejudice. Not a harmful one, it seems, but still a not proven fact stated as one. Also, it’s often written in bad English, that is, English the meme creator believes Asians speak, such as: “Talk to me when you doctor”, instead of “when you’re a doctor”.  

The other popular meme is the Misunderstood-meme. There are a lot of different types of it, from misunderstood shark and douchebag to memes I’m going to discuss here. 

(imghut.com)

The Misunderstood Successful Black Man is maybe used as an attempt to show all racists out there that even black people can be successful, but it doesn’t make it any less wrong. By making this kind of meme, you are stating that successful black people are rarely seen in our society. Wrong. On so many levels. 

 

(tickld.com)

We also have the Misunderstood Redneck-meme. Even though discriminating against white people seems like an OK thing to do, since white people have long been evil, racist and full of prejudice towards all “non-whites” (and some of them, unfortunately, still are!), this is not ok. We fight for a society where everyone is going to be able to feel welcome and not discriminated against and where prejudice is going to be a long forgotten term. Don’t discriminate, not even against those who are racists themselves. Show them you’re better than that.

Why it is dangerous: Every and any emphasizing of prejudice or narrow minded opinions in today’s society is dangerous and counterproductive. Stop dividing people, help them unite.

Meat/Vegetarianism

(captionite.com)

     This is a theme that has bothered me the longest, and that almost doesn’t have anyone fighting against it in the meme-community. We live in the era where it is proven that people should both eat and produce less meat than they do today, thus contributing to both preventing climate change and animal rights issue. However, in the internet community, being a vegetarian is considered stupid or weak, while bacon has become some sort of deity. 

(ipadartroom.com)

Why it is dangerous: Since I am a vegetarian who never liked bacon (even when I used to eat meat), I can’t really understand this trend. At the same time, this meme-shrine to bacon is making something, namely – meat, vastly popular among young people, that is, people who should be able to live on this Earth in the days to come. How is it then not dangerous to promote industrial meat production?

Positive examples

     I wish to end this blog post in a somewhat positive mood, and that's why I present a couple of memes that try to fight against the trends described above. Keep up the good work, open-minded meme-lovers! 

(youthareawesome.com)

(quickmeme.com)

(31.media.tumblr.com)

---

[1] Notice the obvious heteronormative!