Comedy or Reality?

Posted on by Christopher Lauck

According to Merriam-Webster.com, the definition of a meme is as follows, “an idea, behavior, style, or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture”. To me, a meme is a way for an individual to comically mimic a current event, or something about their personal life, to make more relatable with friends and the social media community.

Memes are more comedy centered than reality based because tragic events are not turned into memes. For example, the death of Kobe Bryant would not be something that is transitioned into a meme. Having said that, when Kobe dropped 60 points on Gordon Hayward, it would turn into a meme to either resemble how awfully Hayward’s defense was that night, or how Kobe was just being Kobe.

This is an example of how memes are supposed to be funny and should not be taken seriously. This is an example of the Dolly Parton Challenge Meme, which represents how people tend to have four different types of profile photos (or even personalities) based on their social media platform. Facebook represents your social life and interacting with others, Instagram is supposed to bring out your creative or, “artsy”, self, LinkedIn portrays your professional life, while Tinder represents a photo that attracts the most attention to yourself. This meme is a meme within a meme because Angela, a character from The Office, shows no emotion throughout the show. Therefore, showing the same picture in all four platforms shows that Angela does not change her character in a given setting.

This meme is mimicking the height of Astros player, Jose Altuve, and comparing him to how short Peter Dinklage, a legal dwarf, is. This meme is not literally saying that Dinklage would play Altuve, but it comically juxtaposing Altuve’s height to Dinklage’s.

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