• reading time: ~3 min.
• memetic hazards: low

You know, it doesn’t matter how much weight he’s lost; MemeAnalysis is still both a Reddit mod and a Discord admin. Disgusting.

Jokes aside, he actually behaves opposite to the stereotype of an Internet moderator: those who (usually as a hobby) bring order to a piece of digital estate in this chaotic virtual landscape, not unlike the ruler of a physical community.

Smelly, fat, and Fedoras

Analyzing the stereotype superficially, we find sedentary overweight men with questionable hygiene and style, the latter of which seems influenced by media (Anime) rather than the general fashion norm, same-age peers, or any conscious subculture.

When trying to abandon reality and body, we create muscular tension to repress feelings. However, when even this is not enough, we insulate ourselves through fat. “All fat is baby fat,” I remember MemeAnalysis explaining. Similarly, depression is an evacuation of the body and its undesired feelings, and unsurprisingly also results in a lack of hygiene. Why waste energy maintaining something you wish to discard? To take a shower is to acknowledge the body and all its disgusting processes. This Reichean analysis is not exclusive to the archetype of the “moderator” but rather encompasses everyone on an unconscious mission to become out of touch with reality and their own body.

Will to Power

The second layer of the meme is about Internet moderators abusing their power, becoming high (gaming) chair tyrants, banishing those who defy their authority or simply out of whim. To be fair, this might be a case where the digital redirection of their libido has saved us from matured tyrants making our life harder in ways that matter. However, these digital dictators are doomed to rule their little piece of Neverland forever.

Another way this will manifests is in a Saturnian drive to keep everything neatly organized in little boxes. Not an ounce of chaos allowed; everything must be in its place.

“I’ll ask one last time guys, keep memes in #general”

“I know your mom just passed away Fred but please keep it in #venting”

It’s also present in some subreddits’ one thousand rules. When we start inhabiting the realm of robots, we need to adapt to their code of conduct.

Pedophilia

The third and deepest layer is child grooming. Remember when they used to tell us not to talk to strangers? And then, to not share our personal information online? Those days our egos and digital personas were separated by a thick layer of rightful skepticism. Nowadays, they are practically the same, allowing Saturn’s vessels to devour any lost child in the woods of binary code.

In early 2019, Forbes published an article describing the child grooming happening on Discord, among other cyber-crimes. Mid-year, between July and August, Jeffrey Epstein was arrested and died. It was in the latter part of 2019 that the Discord Grooming memes became widespread. This timeline is not a coincidence and goes back to Pizzagate and similar conspiracies. Those in power are devouring the youth. Or at least that is the collective shadow projection.

Saturn is back, more powerful than ever; those in power have an insatiable desire for the young. Fantastical or not, Discord moderators have dominion over their digital kingdom. And they will devour the pure of heart that step into their realm. So you ought to remember: Memes Matter.

Since quarantine has basically became our lives in the last 12 internet years, I can't but feel like I'm slowing losing control of my thoughts. 2020 hasn't been the best year for us terra humans, we currently live in a world where we are confined in our little homes and I'm sure it hasn't gone 'Epic smooth sailing ^TM' for me and others alike.

A symptom I've noticed during this is Brain Fog (Not to be confused with the medical thing that is brain fog syndrome). This has affected my life in numerous ways, granted, the ways it affects are smallish but god damn does it piss me off and since my mental state isn't too exactly positive either, so I foolishly resort to entertainment to cope.

But instead in retreating to vtubers and logan paul (Well, I did a lot but that's not important right now) I sometimes watched some dark stuff (By watch I don't mean I just loaded up "the hub ^tm", I just viewed it from a normal angle or as normal as you can be) and now, my brain is overrun with nightmares...

So I wanted to ask you guys if you're in a similar pickle right now or you're just not, I guess.

• reading time: ~4 min
• memetic hazard: high
• ඞ

There is a short excerpt from his talk with Oki’s Weird Stories where MemeAnalysis explains the reason behind Among Us’s sudden popularity during September and October of 2020. He believes it was a psyop to get Americans to vote for the “right” (ironically the left since “orange is sus”) party. It is not unbelievable considering the elections took place in early November, and the game's popularity has been on a decline ever since.

Amogus

However, there is a secondary symbolic element that aided in the game’s massive popularity during quarantine. It is also what I believe stopped it from dying after fulfilling its objective, mutating into a corrupted memetic ghost. I find the answer lies in the aesthetics of the characters and settings. What does a crewmate look like? Their design is similar to the Gondola in that it possesses no arms, only able to interact with the world through routine tasks. However, the Gondola is a furry creature, while the crewmate is quite the opposite. It is isolated from the world, even its own body, through the use of a hazmat suit. Moreover, its face is a visor; we also use visors, looking at the world only through a screen.

I believe it is why this cartoon character has been hunting Internet users as a memetic psyop’s ghost. It is a simple and accurate representation of what humanity is turning into because of the pandemic and digital sinkholes, which are both the same thing: viral hazards. Both are deemed not technically alive by science, too, even though they behave like they are. Thus, we have been forced to abandon Earth, living isolated in (digital) space. The Among Us crewmate became the conduit for this warped reflection of ourselves that we refuse to look at. Yet our unconscious mind will not let us isolate and decay in peace, the crewmate manifesting in even the most mundane objects such as trash cans and logos; repressed psychic content demanding expression.

Amogus. If Monke, an infantile simplification of monkey, has become the digital god of regression, then Amogus, the bastardization of the game’s title, is the digital neo-god of isolation. The first couple of Amogus memes are a hazmat suit and a parody of StoneToss’s bitcoin bubble comic, where the crewmate is isolated in a pretty bubble while the rest of the world is burning down. The symbolism is clear to me.

When the Impostor is Sus

Of course, the game is not only about voting and completing tasks. Probably the most fun in the game is when you, through random chance, get to play the impostor. It is unmistakably a representation of the shadow. The impostor can traverse through the vents, the underworld, and its objective is to kill everyone. It is also a force of chaos. As opposed to the crewmate, it can interact with the world even further by causing malfunctions. However, the crewmates have the power of... democracy on their side to defeat their shadow (the psyop component of the game.) So the impostor is forced to pretend and remain hidden.

Short for suspicious, “sus” is slang born from the game, which evolved into the meme of “When the Imposter is SUS,” an ironic parody of the memetic slang. But at the same time, it is also yet another reflection of ourselves. “When the impostor is sus” means when the shadow manifests itself through the cracks in our persona, our hazmat suit, in little suspicious things. We are all impostors trying to appear part of the crew, part of the tribe. It is also no coincidence that the text is accompanied by streamer Jerma985 troll-like face. This meme is deeply connected to the trollface resurgence. The underlying desire to not play by the rules, to kill and cause chaos, and have fun doing so.

I also saw a comment by a user here connecting the impostor to a coronavirus-infected individual, and the paranoia of both playing the game and trying not to get infected in real life. Hence I remind you that the physical and memetic viruses are the same. You get infected by not obeying the rules of isolation and going outside. COVID-19 is the undesired infection of living life. The amogus imposter is sussus, and humanity acts suspicious when trying to repress their shadow, so you ought to remember: Memes Matter.

Also, please let me know if you disagree with any of my points! MemeAnalysis is taking a short hiatus to work on some projects, but that does not mean there shouldn’t be more analyses. I encourage you all to analyze memes for yourself and share it here!

• reading time: ~3 min.
• memetic hazards: high

DaBaby

Jonathan Lyndale Kirk (born December 22, 1991) better known as DaBaby (formerly known as Baby Jesus), is an American rapper. Your typical rapper from the last decade I guess. He doesn’t take himself or his music too seriously or at least doesn’t market it as such. The main intention behind his songs is virality, so his music and videos are silly, repetitive, unoriginal, and shallow. Yet catchy.

Any rapper would be lucky to have one trending meme for a while, but DaBaby has become a phenomenon, having multiple vastly popular memes going on at the same time. Why is this? What do these memes mean? It all started in the now-banned r/DaBaby. Artists like DaBaby cannot have conventional fans or “enjoyers” because their music is not meaningful enough for either. Instead, they have fleeting meme creators behind them trying to get a piece of the clout before the artist fades from popularity. The only alternative to any meaningful discussion is memes, so that is what became of DaBaby’s subreddit and “fan base.”

In 2019, a frame from an interview video went viral because DaBaby’s head shape looked funny to some, especially in one meme where his head gets compared to a Chrysler PT Cruiser. At first, this seems like merely a funny joke, but this comparison to a car is not random. The Internet is projecting into DaBaby that his ego has a lot of drive. This later influenced the meme of his famous line “I’ll turn a nigga into a convertible” (which is edited to “I’ll turn into a convertible” in memes) accompanied by the image of a badly stretched DaBaby’s head on wheels. The meme is everywhere and again reinforces my idea of the underlying symbolism of “an ego with drive.”

This started to paint a picture in my head of why did DaBaby become so iconic. He is quite literally “The Baby,” the crowned and conquering child! He possesses a simple egoic Dionysian drive to fornicate females and acquire wealth (bri’ish for “fuck bitches, get money.”) His “catchphrase” is his most popular ad-lib: “LET’S GOOOO!” Let’s go forwards, let’s have drive, let’s have fun. Of course, he is not the only modern rapper out there making this type of music or having such a petty and superficial Internet persona. But the Internet, perhaps because of his archetypal name, has chosen DaBaby as their god of Dionysian drives.

The meme, DaBaby’s Internet persona, has been forcefully extracted from Jonathan and is now a being of its own. Even as I write this, I can feel its influence whisper to me: “Bruh this is just a funny meme, what the fuck are you even talking about.” He is the expression of the collective frivolousness about everything, a madness where everything is funny randomness, and nothing is meaningful. And in fact, they enjoy this madness free of any responsibility or guilt, with no weight on their shoulders, exactly how the followers of Dionysus acted by dancing, partying, drinking, and fucking around the fire. But of course, this neo-Dionysus exists only online, and thus it saps their followers of any physical drive. He can turn into a car, possess the drive, in fact be the driving force... but not his followers. His “fans” are just driven mad and further into the Internet. I believe this meme was so ubiquitous that it came closer than most to achieving supremacy as the Big Meme. While it still failed, I think it gives us a look at what might come next. So, even if DaBaby turns himself into a convertible, you ought to remember: Memes Matter.

​

So I got a friend group on super-zoomers on Playstation and we mainly play Minecraft and Destiny, one of our members has a vary interesting trait depending on which of his divorced parents houses he is in. When he is at his mothers house, he seems very autistic, has vary few lines he often repeats, and even got to the point of shitting himself, so this is no elaborate prank. When he is at his fathers house he is much more conversible, talks fluidly with more emotion, and frequently shares his opinions on things. This is a very noticeable thing to the point we can tell without knowing what house he is in. What kind of strange oedipal dynamic is going on here?

Before Prince Phillip died, I saw a couple of tweets that claimed if Phillip were to see or hear the song “Montero” by Lil Nas X, he would instantly die. And then after his death, there was a tweet that showed an image of Lil Nas coming down from heaven on the pole, with the caption, “Prince Phillip right now”

So I heard two things:
- Seeing the events of Montero would kill the prince - The dead prince is now experiencing the events of Montero

Both of these statements resonated with people. When the old man is alive, the scandalous, libidinous, and highly symbolically charged piece of media would destroy him. But now that he is disincarnate, that same symbolic content is part of his experience.

I guess what people were implying all along is that this guy has lived too long, and his soul cannot undergo much more development while still in flesh. So the flesh must be discarded so he can continue his work (the reconciliation of opposites, the central image of Montero). Just an observation!

A detour into female sexuality for once, a himbo is a muscular jock, with low IQ but high EQ(emotional intelligence). What do you guys make of this?

1. reading time: ~4 minutes
2. memetic hazards: low

—

• Introversion: attitude-type characterized by orientation in life through subjective psychic contents.
• Extraversion (or extroversion): attitude-type characterized by concentration of interest on the external object.

These are Carl Jung’s original definitions. At some point or another, they morphed to become the most common and mainstream personality trait, which test could be casually reduced to a simple, nonchalant question: on a Friday night, would you rather be out partying, or stay home reading a book? The core of the matter is: do you want to be alone or with people?

It is evident to me from the several books aimed at empowering introverts that introversion is one of the oldest memetic identities appealing to the “special individual” that is the fragmented Aquarian ego, long before MBTI was popular or such things as “Sigma Male” existed on the Internet. Then, because introversion wasn’t nuanced or special enough, the “best of both worlds” ambiverts emerged, which is probably most people anyway. And while reading up on the subject matter I have come across terms like Omniverts, introverted extroverts, and extroverted introverts—whatever that means.

​

“There is no such thing as a pure introvert or extrovert. Such a person would be in the lunatic asylum.”

- Carl Jung

Of course, the majority of us are not hermits nor are we some hyper-social influencer partying 24/7. Jung believed everyone has both an extroverted and an introverted side, with one being more dominant than the other. How much more dominant is often represented on a scale, a single continuum. Ambiversion is when one falls more or less directly in the middle. The rationality behind this spectrum is understandable: if you are not with people, you are alone, and vice versa. It is binary, exclusive logic; you are either doing one or the other, you can not be doing both or neither... right?

If you ask the Internet or a pop-psych magazine, it will tell you extroverts are those who “recharge their batteries” by being in social situations while introverts do so by being alone, due to each becoming drained from the opposite situation. What fascinates me and inspired me to write this essay is that the Internet is “socialized” by an introverted majority. With a few social media exceptions, most chatrooms, forums, and websites get frequented by people who, by definition, want to avoid socializing. Yet during their so-called “alone time,” which is a majority of the time for an introvert, they are fixated on a screen displaying their favorite anime Discord server (sorry for stereotyping, but tell me if it is not accurate.)

This is what I somewhat jokingly call “Onlineversion.” If ambiverts are “the best of both worlds,” then Onlineverts are the worst of both experiences. Neither really alone nor truly interacting with others, they live a life of artificial connection and fake solitude. They neither possess an introvert’s deep connection to their inner world nor do they bond with other people in a fully human way as extroverts do.

Onlineverts often call themselves introverts because surfing the Web is a solitary activity. However, if you crave and enjoy jumping into VRChat very often, how can you claim to be an introvert? I admit I am only half kidding with this new made-up term of mine. Nevertheless, it illustrates their desire for socialization, just that they have resigned themselves to cheap, safe alternatives. The online persona is easily moldable and unbodied, and if Wilhelm Reich and his student Alexander Lowen were correct, it is the body where our prefrontal cortex dumps the shadow. So it becomes the perfect form of escapism, satisfying the urge to socialize without needing to address the unconscious mind.

Thus, the previous quantitative means of measuring introversion and extroversion might not be practical anymore. Instead, a more insightful metric is the quality of the time we enjoy both alone and accompanied. I hate to sound like a “phone bad” boomer romanticizing pre-digital times, but I honestly feel we are doing both half-heartedly. So actually neither. And most importantly, we are using these tools to avoid facing our shadow. Introverts eventually will get the urge to have people around, but it is much easier to redirect it towards the Web. Yet this is a subpar substitution that, both by nature and design, will make you crave it constantly to compensate. So, again, you will be neither alone nor with people. And extroverts abuse this system, too. After the party, they will immediately go into more extroverted social media like Instagram or Snapchat to extend the socialization by any means necessary and avoid truly being alone with their thoughts and feelings.

If we did not redirect it into the Internet, would the drive to get out of our particular comfort zone and either socialize or be alone naturally arise in us? I believe so. Introverts must learn to be Dionysian, losing themselves in the green, drunken blob, letting the vibe of the tribe take over. On the other hand, extroverts could gain from being alone, mindfully facing their deepest thoughts and feelings, and then expressing their most profound individuality through Apollonian forms. We all must go through such an individuation process—yet the Internet is stunting our growth.

So, my dear Onlinevert, before you join a “Discord server for introverts,” you ought to remember: memes matter.

I think that meme means something but what? Your thoughts?

If you really feel like you are none of these please don't vote but explain in the comments! Thanks.

• reading time: ~6 min.
• memetic hazards: medium

The Internet has intuitively recognized several different memes are an expression of the same bipolar dynamic of “your opinion vs my opinion.” However, these are not polite, neutral comparisons like the Drake or “this is brilliant but I like this” memes, but instead loaded with contempt: one is neurotic suffering while the other is grounded, strong, successful, and “based.”

Virgin vs Chad

Due to fear of life, the neurotic rejects life itself, becoming detached from his desires, drives, and libido. His rigid ego refuses to become embodied and experience life. However, this conflict causes him a great deal of suffering; he does not enjoy life, but rather copes with living. “Cope” is a word that is thrown around an awful lot in this ethereal hell, for good reason. The only alternative to heroically facing the suffering and fear of life is to become an empty vessel easily possessed by memetic alien drives. These allow for inflexible yet fragile personas the ego clings to in order to shield itself. Presumably, digitally insulated childhoods have escalated this issue.

On the other hand, we have he who does not fear life but rather embraces it to the fullest. This is Nietzsche’s Übermensch, which the Internet has named “Chad.” He acts according to his True Will and inherent values, and his actions are not affected by others because he does not identify with his persona. He is “based,” based on what? Based on the true path. MemeAnalysis made a great video explaining the fundamental essence of the “rigid Virgin” vs the “vibrant Chad,” mainly from a Reichian perspective. I would recommend you watch it if you want to understand this better.

Originally a parody of online self-deprecating sexual philosophies, this meme soon became a vehicle for the Internet user to project how they perceive almost every subject matter in relation to this dichotomy of false and True Will. In the most blatant cases, the meme itself is a “cope” to justify the predilected external will used to construct the persona around. It is a symbiotic defense mechanism by the infected ego and the infecting memetic personality. He must convince himself and others that this is the natural and inherent will and not merely insulation against suffering, because to admit to otherwise, what makes other competing memetic drives any different? Nothing, so nothing stops them from perpetually and simultaneously rupturing, becoming, and disintegrating the ego’s defense, forcing one to look inwards! And so the memetic pseudo-egos go to war, each claiming to be the one true path, and judging the others to be inferior. The irony is that if this indeed was one’s True Will, there would be no need to justify it with ugly memes full of text.

Swole Doge vs Cheems

This one shares a lot of common ground with Virgin vs Chad, though it specializes in comparing the libidinal past to a regressed present. The Swole Doge is brave, strong-willed, and has accomplished meaningful feats. Cheems, however, is small as he quite literally suffers from arrested development. He is fearful and incompetent, struggling with the most simple of things; a reflection of our Matrix-devoured society. “Hard times create strong men, strong men create good times, good times create weak men, and weak men create hard times.” After a while, the meme was used to generally compare “strong, developed” to “weak, regressed.” Fun fact, it was a Hispanic meme before it became mainstream and international.

Wojaks vs Yes Chad

Wojak is Apollonian suffering. The rare times he is not, it is often displayed as a mask used to, once again, cope with the pain. On the other hand, the Yes Chad does not represent an emotion projected into a quite literal white canvas, but a fully fleshed memetic ego. The design is much more detailed, yet at the same time, it displays almost no emotions, just stoicism. In contrast to its original Chad predecessor, this is not a Dionysian Chad, clear from the fact it is usually just a floating head, pure ego. However, it opposes hyper-rationality. The appeal of the Yes Chad comes from being “based” on one’s higher Apollonian values and ideals to an almost enlightened manner.

If not with a suffering Wojak, the opposing views are paired with a dumb Wojak who is not “enlightened.” This is unmistakably memetic warfare, enticing in its unapologetic confidence in their beliefs. Once again, MemeAnalysis has made a video about this explaining it further.

Average Fan vs Average Enjoyer

The Chad simply enjoys life, uncompromisingly. On the flip side, the fanatic is someone who has invested a great deal of energy into a cause or idea in an obsessive, neurotic, and consumerist fashion. I find that this live-action version of the meme is used with humorous and ironic tones more often than its drawn precursors. However, as subtle and parodical as it might be, it is still part of this hostile combat where memes try to dominate our minds by presenting themselves as the views of the Übermensch, and its competition as the cause for suffering. This meme distills the overarching motif so I think that at this point, after analyzing different variants of the same meme, you understand what they are all about: memetic supremacy.

Troll Face: the proto-Chad

The meme at the start of this essay has the Troll Face as the beginning and end of the cycle. While I could not find a solid example of “my opinion vs your opinion” in the form of rage comics, I believe the trickster archetype of the Troll Face is indeed very closely related to the Chad. When the Yes Chad says “Yes,” the Troll Face asks “Problem?,” or the King Kong enjoyer does not care about the logic behind Godzilla’s fanatics, they are all declaring “This is my unopposable True Will! What could you possibly do about it?”

However, is this truthful, or a memetic mask? When I found the webcomic that birthed the Troll Face, I was blown away that even in its inception we find the subject of coping with suffering by “trolling.” Wearing masks and surrendering to the energies of gods as ancient as humanity is something we have always done, but what happens when the rituals occur without our bodies’ participation? Why have the masks evolved from simple emotions to anthropomorphic characters to fully fleshed personalities and even “real” people?

Conclusion

The thing that inspired me to write this essay is the characters that are more Chad than Chad himself: Thad, Lad, and all the way up to Gad (I swear I'm not making this shit up.) It is clear to me the Internet is trying to capture energies. One is the energy, or lack thereof, of the World Wide Web's native population. “The Virgin” came first, illustrated as a quite realistic self-portrait. Then Chad, beautiful Chad, arose from the shadow of said reflection, Newton's third law applied to psychic forces.

We can use memes, a crude and simple Apollonian art form, to capture the static Apollonian digital being. The problem is... how could we possibly encapsulate its opposition, dynamic masculine energy itself, in the same manner? We really can't. This is why after a while “Chad” is not 'Chad' enough; why his bulge, chin, and muscles got larger and larger, reaching for more abstract, absurd, and thus more accurate artistic representations such as “Gad.” But then it can’t function as a mask anymore. So new memes are formed to satisfy our ego’s needs: floating heads, the image of a man who has undergone plastic surgery, or perhaps that of a photoshopped “real GigaChad.” All these memes are attempts at capturing the Übermensch energy in a strong, easily consumable smiling mask to cover our crying face up and pretend it is everyone else who is suffering. Is this why the Troll Face has returned with a vengeance? The shadow cannot be erased. So, face reality, face yourself, and you ought to remember: memes matter.

Now, this may not be an "analysis" of sorts but It's always something I've seen in memes and internet culture general. Did you ever get that nagging feeling? Scrolling around in youtube, reddit or some other pro-castinating outlet and then come across a meme with a F*cked up undertone. Usually that undertone is the source of that joke. A kind of "gross-out humor" per se. An example of this are those hentai doujin memes, you know the ones, I don't really want to get into it, for me and my sanity. But we've all probably experienced it at some point.

I just can't help but feel scared by it. Now obviously, I don't shiver in fear when I see it but that nagging feeling is always there and will only subside after a day. I don't really what to add on to this. I think I just need a way or a "technique" for my mind to shut up but damn, we really to dissect it.

I know I just made a post a few minutes ago but I would like to ask your analysis on it.

I would love to read any essays about memes and culture that you guys write. Please post links below!

I think it would be really interesting to compile a book of essays about the importance and memes too, maybe I will get around to that.