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I'm getting tired of modern meme culture

• revx 5y ago
  https://archive.md/QXUFv https://archive.md/QXUFv
• ArtDev 5y ago
  What ruined memes for me: reddit.com/r/hermainCainAward This is the "Covid is fake" social media posts of people who died from Covid. Mostly, these are reposts of meme tropes but with a misinformed/paranoid Covid slant. I can't help but wonder about the people who make these memes. Obviously, not all are Russian agents.. but some probably are.
  • smackeyacky 5y ago
    That subreddit is horrible. Take some selective posts of dead people and highlight them in a macabre game of "I told you so". Its not going to change minds about vaccination or pull people out of their conspiracy mindsets, it will just reinforce the tribalism that allows misinformation to spread. I wish they would shut it down.
    • paxys 5y ago
      Why do you assume people posting there have any agenda? Heck why should everything on the internet have an agenda or end goal? That subreddit is a large-scale collection of "I told you so" Facebook posts, as you said, and that's it. It isn't some vaccination campaign. People can take whatever they want out of it. Darwin awards have been a thing for a long time and are part of internet culture. The material there isn't what's wrong with the internet, rather all the calls for "xyz should be shut down" for anything slightly offensive to someone's sensibilities are the problem. If you don't like it, close the browser window and move on with your life.
      • smackeyacky 5y ago
        Of course there is an agenda behind it. Pro tip, the name of the subreddit is a bit of a clue.
    • JetAlone 5y ago
      There was an interesting comment in another HN thread, where something like this got talked about: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29558521 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29558521 Applying that theory here would be to create a feedback loop where the Herman Cain Award content causes more digging in, causes more deaths, generates more Herman Cain Awards. Imagine if you were the creator or an early adopter/moderator of such a community and it grows explosively... If the theory is correct, this is a highly profitable activity for capitalizing socially on the deaths of your political enemies, and while controversial, could net you a status as a lionized hero in some communities, the ones who are sick and tired of the political enemies due to past experiences, and love seeing members of them die.
• unbanned 5y ago
  Am I out of touch? No it's the children who are wrong. Give it a rest. Let young people enjoy whatever they want to enjoy, you are not the comedy police.
• yesbut 5y ago
  That site is like one big meme.
• greatwave1 5y ago
  Based on several statements like this: >I feel this fact was exemplified by the "Damn Daniel" clip from 2015. I hated it at the time and still do. There was no humour to it. It was funny because everyone else thought it was funny. It seems like a lot of author's criticisms are due to them no longer being a part of the in-group which memes are being created by and intended for. I can ensure you, many teenagers found humor in the "Damn Daniel" clip in 2015. Given how heavily memes are tied to identification with an in-group, I imagine they will have an ever stronger "kids these days don't know real music" effect than other forms of pop culture.
  • Aunche 5y ago
    I don't see how "Damn Daniel" is significantly different from "Badger Badger." I do agree with the author's other point that memes these days are much more mean spirited than they used to be. People these days tend to treat people they disagree with as if they were caricature wojaks rather than real people with complicated beliefs and motivations.
    • unbanned 5y ago
      Are they? A lot of image macros from SA, 4chan, b3ta etc.. were racist and hate filled... Completely agree with Badger Badger. Weebls stuff cartoons were funny, because it was something to enjoy with people who also had access to the internet (which was quite few at the time, so the "in crowd") Additionally to explain why Damn Daniel is funny is as difficult as explaining why anything is funny.
      • ASalazarMX 5y ago
        Some people find "Badger badger" funny, and some don't. It's the same with "Damn, Daniel". I know about music and badgers and mushrooms and the "honey badger don't care" memes, so I find the badger song funny. I don't know anything about Daniel or his friend, and without context I don't find them funny. Now the images with a swirl blur effect that say "DAVE", "BROCCOLI", etc., for some reason I find some of them hilarious.
    • 5y ago
• 8f2ab37a-ed6c 5y ago
  It's been interesting to see the evolution of memes, from ultra-niche Internet-culture stuff of sites like Something Awful, Newgrounds, YTMND and 4chan to becoming completely rote and mainstream. It's a little like when parents discovered Facebook, and it stopped feeling as exclusive, even though old school memes were never "hip" in any common sense, mostly reserved for hardcore Internet "basement dwellers" of yore.
• monus21 5y ago
  Tldr - The author likes some memes and doesn't like others. I'm not sure why this warrants a blog post.
  • johncoltrane 5y ago
    Isn't that exactly what blogs and blog posts are supposed to be? Personal? Besides, it's actually a thread in a subforum whose description starts with "This board is dedicated to what you see around the world, news and your opinions." which fits rather well. Now, whether it is HN-worthy or not is another story.
  • pech0rin 5y ago
    You're not sure why someone decided to express their opinion on the internet? Did you just wake up for a 40 year coma?
• stephentmcm 5y ago
  Tell me you don't understand memes without telling me you don't understand memes. Memes != Jokes. A meme is a repeated and iterated phenomenon be it a picture, phrase, video, image or thought. Just because it isn't funny (to you) doesn't make it a meme, just because you find it funny doesn't make it a meme. To graduate from thing to meme needs repetition, iteration and spread.
  • coldtea 5y ago
    You don't seem to understand memes. It's not about the etymology or the repeatition and spread. That's just where the name comes from. But once memes got into an established culture of its own, with specific norms, practices, designs, and so on, you can make a meme even if it gets no views and is not shared with nobody ever. If it catches on it's a viral meme. But even if it doesn't catch on (or even if it stays on the creators hard drive forever), such a creation can fully have a meme format, form, and content and thus be a meme in that (duck-typing) sense. Don't get too caught on the initial Dawkins-derived descriptions of memes by the popular press, that focused on the viral aspect. That was important to make memes a cultural force, and to contribute to aspects of it (self-reference, folk re-workings, and so on). But virality is not the be-all end-all ever since there's a huge established meme legacy and practice. Same how you can make "pop music" (music that follows the form, production, values etc of pop song) even if it's not popular, and never breaks into the top-200, or even if nobody ever hears it except you and your DAW.
    • BlueTemplar 5y ago
      "Words for communication" are different from "words for thinking", but both aspects are important. If you forget about the "words for thinking" aspect, then you are doomed to keep getting stuck in pointless discussions that get nowhere about, for instance, "socialism". (And the "words for communication" aspects is obviously important for quick communication.)
  • theshrike79 5y ago
    Yes, that's the dictionary definition of meme. But in practical use "meme" has devolved to mean "a picture with a joke" pretty much. There may be a meme-like shared component, but mostly it's just a picture with a joke in it.
• cyberge99 5y ago
  [flagged]
• unixhero 5y ago
  Dude what is that place? Such a cute forum! :)
  • echelon 5y ago
    I was thinking the same thing. I want to be transported to that aesthetic place and time.
• clpm4j 5y ago
  It's definitely something I've felt more and more as I've aged out of my youth. For me it's driven mainly by an increased desire to reject the crowd. Almost anything that a majority of people find "cool" or "in" turns me off and I reject it. I no longer care about what my peers think of me - I rarely think about my peers. I guess I've become much more self centered in a way - not selfish, but just much more concerned with being my own person.
  • kaetemi 5y ago
    Knowledge that is less common is more valuable. Even in social situations, you can just stay ignorant of pop knowledge, and still amaze peers with relevant obscure trivia.
• rpmisms 5y ago
  I'm probably one of the younger posters here, and memes are a welcome respite from the slog of my day-to-day. They're not always funny, they're not even always good. Memes are both information-dense and informal, a great combination for relaxing without feeling dumb.
• GhettoComputers 5y ago
  > Memes today seem to increasingly serve the function of a means of communicating ones personal opinions towards a subject with often times quite nasty undertones. Many memes today focus around an element of domination of the perceived opponents of whatever group or ideology made by the meme in question. He sounds like the Virgin in the Virgin VS Chad meme. Remixing memes has been that way forever, bad advice dog turned into advice animals that also served opinions.
  • JetAlone 5y ago
    Faction Chads are cool and funny.
• isaacimagine 5y ago
  TL;DR: Author expresses his dislike for modern meme culture as a move away from classic humor and towards baseless self expression. Ironically, this long rant of self expression could be a meme.
• Barrin92 5y ago
  debatable to what degree meme culture has become more repetitive but I think there's probably something to it. Mark Fisher borrowed the term Hauntology from Derrida to describe this kind of media consumption/production. He thought that one key aspect of the way we communicate was that we're essentially trapped in a sort of self-referential loop that cannot escape old aesthetics, ideas or forms and that we had in a sense cancelled the future or anything genuinely new. It seems like that's the sort of thing the OP feels about memes, and people have often observed it about retro-pop fiction like Ready Player One, the intensity with which fashion is recycled, the never-ending superhero movies that now comprise most of mainstream cinema, and so forth. Subjectively kind of like you're stuck in some 2000s videogame where nobody bothered to turn the servers off. I think that's a sort of feeling many people have about large parts of the media today in some form or another.
• deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
• jareklupinski 5y ago
  > Take yourself back to when you would have been laughing non-stop at say "pingas" hehehehehehehe ty author
• omegaham 5y ago
  There have always been stupid memes and injokes on the Internet. Usenet had them in spades, forums had them, and now Reddit, Twitter, and Facebook all have them. They weren't always in image format, as image hosting wasn't as easy back then, but there is no real difference between sharing a Wojak meme to describe a certain situation and repeating a Bash.org IRC quote. OP is annoyed with the fact that today's kids have had different experiences than him and are making memes and injokes that don't make any sense to him. It happens to everyone at some point. Quoting Grandpa Simpson, > I used to be with 'it,' but then they changed what 'it' was. Now what I’m with isn’t 'it' anymore, and what’s 'it' seems weird and scary. It’ll happen to youuuuu! Are the kids still making Simpsons references, or have they all moved to Spongebob references?
  • dreadlordbone 5y ago
    Surprisingly Simpsons memes hold on.
    • dane-pgp 5y ago
      Here's another relevant one: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/am-i-out-of-touch https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/am-i-out-of-touch
• RobRivera 5y ago
  log off and go /out/, anon
  • sgt 5y ago
    These days a lot of people never log out. They sit in the park browsing their phone.
  • jamil7 5y ago
    “Touch grass” is what the zoomers say now.
• zzzbra 5y ago
  I dunno. I think OP may be right about changes in meme culture, but I don’t think OP is being anything but nostalgic in any of the examples given. memes are more sophisticated insofar as they’re more self aware and self referential but they’re not necessarily meaner or more degenerate. YTMND anyone?
• wly_cdgr 5y ago
  "Am I just getting older?" Yes...in fact the answer to this question is always yes
  • ARandomerDude 5y ago
    The answer to "Am I getting older?" is always yes. The answer to "Am I just getting older?" is not always yes. The "just" often implies complete or nearly complete explanatory causality in English.
    • wly_cdgr 5y ago
      Yeah, I know. That's just my point
    • thaumasiotes 5y ago
      > The answer to "Am I getting older?" is always yes. Completely off topic, but I always appreciated how what take the form of echo lyrics in They Might Be Giants' Older actually maintain their full meaning as they echo: You're older than you've ever been and now you're even older And now you're even older And now you're even older You're older than you've ever been and now you're even older And now you're older still
      • Dylan16807 5y ago
        Well if we want memes, let's go with smash mouth. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eT3BFzSD6YY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eT3BFzSD6YY The years start coming and they don't stop coming And they don't stop coming And they don't stop coming And they don't stop coming
• paxys 5y ago
  AKA "I am growing up and getting more out of touch with what's in". Happens to all of us buddy.
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
• hayley-patton 5y ago
  From my perspective, memes got pretty self-deprecating and ironic from around 2017. As the author states, this means that such memes are only funny when one gets the context, but this is almost okay when one creates memes for an in-group. Thus the context dependence of memeing is not unlike other forms of in-jokes; but I don't know if other sorts of in-jokes become as ironic on a similar timescale.
• Kiro 5y ago
  I feel the same but I also acknowledge that I'm a boomer. I think this video explains why I feel so detached from today's meme culture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVlspd9hxFA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVlspd9hxFA tl;dw: The dynamics are completely different and esoteric for someone used to traditional humor and memes.
  • severak_cz 5y ago
    This video is great.
• josh8042 5y ago
  Sounds like he's a meme snob, not a meme bob: https://imgur.com/AdnT9mK https://imgur.com/AdnT9mK
  • raverbashing 5y ago
    This looks like it came from some place you got off a wrong turn on the internet Like those fake Pixar movies
• causi 5y ago
  Over 9000 began as a joke among Naruto fans related to poor dubbing Is this guy just trying to get a rise out of me by being spectacularly wrong on purpose?
  • bejd 5y ago
    That's where they lost me. See also >Take for example wojak. Although originally used to further various right-wing talking points I wouldn't expect everyone to know the origin of every meme, but even a cursory internet search [0] will show that Wojaks started out far more benign. [0] https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/wojak https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/wojak
    • JetAlone 5y ago
      >TFW politicized but still no gf
  • BurningPenguin 5y ago
    I wondered too. Wasn't it from Dragon Ball?
    • toyg 5y ago
      The content is definitely from DragonBall. Technically speaking, though, the meme could have emerged in any community with a knowledge of anime, since DragonBall knowledge is basically assumed in those circles. So it might be that Naruto fans brought DB into a discussion about bad translations. The reality is that, in most cases, nobody can really know for sure where a meme generated from - we can only witness the first usage in communities we observe.
  • isoprophlex 5y ago
    > Over 9000 began as a joke among Naruto fans I stopped reading the article with this exact segment copy-pasted, in order to comment about it. Am I being taken for a ride here?!
  • BlueTemplar 5y ago
• shimfish 5y ago
  Came across this Gen-Z humour explainer video recently: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVlspd9hxFA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVlspd9hxFA In a nutshell, I think he's saying that it's funny because it's not funny.
• paxys 5y ago
  As my gen Z cousin would say - "ok boomer"
• AgentME 5y ago
  This is funny that the "badger, badger, badger" video was their first example, because I used it as my first example the other day while arguing that old meme culture was only ever popular because early internet users were deprived of a large source of good niche internet humor, latching onto any scraps like a starving person. That video was popular as shock humor because of the surprise of encountering an animation so pointlessly catchy. That type of absurdist shock humor wears off fast as you get exposed to more of it. I do like their categorization of the past's "memes as [shock] humor" vs the modern "memes as expression", though I had expected to see that as a point that modern meme culture has more depth and versatility.
• woutr_be 5y ago
  I don't really care for memes, and it's totally fine people are into them, there's plenty of places on the internet where you can enjoy them. What I do get annoyed about, is that even on the more serious subreddits, every comment is just an attempt to meme or make a joke. Try reading /r/worldnews and observe how none of the comments are actually thought out, they're just memes. Or that even in technical articles, people feel the need to throw 5 meme gifs in there, I just close the article straight away.
  • allenu 5y ago
    It’s incredibly frustrating. I find myself paging down as soon as I see a thread turning into memes and jokes, or collapsing whole threads. It made me start to think it would be great if there was a “serious replies only” filter to omit all that stuff.
  • baxuz 5y ago
    HN is slowly becoming the new (old) Reddit in some ways.
    • dane-pgp 5y ago
      Always has been.
      • jgod 5y ago
        I see what you did there
  • jktogjfnn 5y ago
    HN is also becoming memefied: Electron is bad Nuclear energy is good Pharma makers of opioids are bad and should be fined out of existence Drugs are good and should be legalized and available in pharma-grade purity and consistency
    • sheepdestroyer 5y ago
      Not everything is "just your opinion, man". Every side of an argument can be argued for, so every position ever is equally valid? It's not because a side of an argument is gaining traction in certain communities, for its own merit as far as I know (I believe in objective truth btw), that this is sufficient for calling that (pejoratively, as your comment feels to me) a "meme".
• inshadows 5y ago
  Thanks. There's nothing like such walls of text on the front page. Very "Hacker". Much "News".
• aguasfrias 5y ago
  Modern meme culture is just modern culture. Information is embedded in society memetically, at least in Dawkins' framework. That memes are simple, stupid jokes like "badger badger badger" is itself a meme. This isn't nitpicking. The author lacking a strong definition of "meme" makes their blog post read like childish whining. However, the author makes a good point if you think about it. To cut through all the meme history, it seems the author has a problem with "memes" being commoditized and leveraged by the powerful and interested, in order to sway public opinion. Worse, the average person can't help but get caught in the gears of the machine, because meme savvy can be an important factor for acceptance into certain social groups. This means minting memes becomes valuable. Being able to turn Pepe the Frog into a divisive character has political value. Being able to inflict a notion of "coomer/doomer/bloomer" on people has political value. It feels cheap compared to the more organic process of the past because it is. It is deliberately cheap so as to make it easy to analyze, process, and improve. The interests pushing the latest memes need them to be cheap because cheap is effective, much like making food sugary just makes it more addictive. And unfortunately, unlike the food industry, memes will probably not be regulated, because there is no objective metric of the harm they cause when leveraged in a coordinated way. It would be like regulating gossip and hearsay. Ultimately, what the author laments is that what used to be fun has been hijacked as a utility in a sociopolitical war for influence.
• pleb_nz 5y ago
  What's with the ad type badges at bottom of each comment?
• satisfice 5y ago
  Why is anyone taking this seriously? This is trivial; memes are worthless. I read this piece just to experience it as a cautionary tale about wasting time with my writing. Even this comment is suspect. At least it is only five sentences long.
• Festro 5y ago
  The author falls into the trap of viewing the internet as the same monolith they were used to when they were younger. In fact it was a mass of subcultures back then as it is now, just far larger and more varied now. They had tunnel vision then when they found the memes they readily interacted with funny, and now, older, more cynical, in a smaller subculture, they find the vocal minorities of the million other subcultures, that are easier than ever to be exposed to, more annoying. Part of it is that they're older, part of it is that the different generations find different things funny, part of it is that younger people who haven't seen the old jokes DO find them funny all over again, part of it is not realising that a popular community on the web making a new popular meme =/= universal hilarity. They're being shortsighted and grouchy, like humans are prone to do as they age because they expected norms to remain static, and can't see the bigger picture. There are still plenty of subjectively funny memes out there for the author, more than there ever were in fact. They're just getting hung up on everything else because it's a way to gain prestige amongst like-minded grouches.
• twic 5y ago
  I think Jessica3cho's response in this thread is the definitive answer, because she has more ironic web badges than anyone else.
• noisy_boy 5y ago
  What annoys me is the forced injection of memes on tech presentations. Not saying it never works - some folks have the talent and the timing. However most of the times, it just elicits forced smiles out of politeness.
  • MrBuddyCasino 5y ago
    People that have something to say do so using text alone, the idea is rarely enhanced by the borrowed creativity of a meme or even an emoji. Its tempting to use something that made you smile, but it only comes across as lazy humour. It is the cringe tech equivalent of flat art & HR speak.
  • notacoward 5y ago
    Agreed. A few well placed memes can be fantastic for moderating the mood, pace, or engagement level of a presentation. It's truly a joy to see one well used. On the other hand, when the author is obviously stretching for a meme to put on every single slide, it's just exhausting. It also starts to look a lot like laziness or insecurity, relying on humor because they're not confident about the content itself keeping people's attention. There seem to be a lot of frustrated stand-up comedians giving tech presentations. Seriously, I'd rather watch a good presentation and a real stand-up comedian separate, not a Frankensteinian stitching together of the two.
• deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
• nikanj 5y ago
  I used to be with ‘it’, but then they changed what ‘it’ was. Now what I’m with isn’t ‘it’ anymore and what’s ‘it’ seems weird and scary. It’ll happen to you!
• cortexio 5y ago
  > Wojaks can be used by just about anyone for any purpose. It's the same for Pepe and just about any other image based meme format. Older memes by contrast had a solid base. I dont agree with this. We already had memes with multiple purposes. https://i.pinimg.com/564x/a1/de/27/a1de27eb430466b48c31b03a1d9e25bd.jpg https://i.pinimg.com/564x/a1/de/27/a1de27eb430466b48c31b03a1... https://i.pinimg.com/564x/4d/a7/70/4da7703c373818e0e7c9a9143cded7a6.jpg https://i.pinimg.com/564x/4d/a7/70/4da7703c373818e0e7c9a9143... Although an interesting read. It's my opinion that meme culture today is the same as 10-15 years ago. It's not better or worse. It seems the same. Although i would say the internet itself has changed alot. The internet used to be a place for regular people. Now it's full of corporations. It's all about money and advertisement these days, not communities. That's what i miss. I think this overly corporated internet does have an effect on meme culture though. In my opinion we have become less creative. Big platforms became addictive loops and content creators become content factories. Both which are not good for creativity. Which is somewhat a point i think the OP made in that certain memes arent being replaced with new ones. e.g. pepe. But then again. Pepe is the best.
• scandox 5y ago
  As others have pointed out the OP's dislike of newer memes is merely a function of age and/or conservatism. But there is a deeper criticism to be made of memes. They are often a thought killer. As with much humour on the internet they are often used as a form of social control within a group. Thinking maybe some Other has a reasonable point? Boom: a hilarious meme that shows why people who consider the Other's ideas are just vacillating ninnies. You laugh at your reasonable self. Thought stopped. Memes are really good at that.
• moth-fuzz 5y ago
  I remember way back when memes used to come in a variety of affects, expressing different things. Memes for humor, memes for grief, memes for libido, memes for political commentary, and yes, there's also of course memes for nothing other than establishing in-group/out-group. But I can't help but notice every new 'meme' these days is a variation on "this thing is good" "this other thing is bad". It's the same format with the same intended message but with different images swapped in and out. I think it might reflect the immense polarization of society combined with social media's general push for 'engagement' i.e. antagonization of each other. But I don't get why every new 'meme' these days has to draw some line in the sand.
• RamblingCTO 5y ago
  I remember the times where memes were only circulated on places like 4chan/krautchan or whateverchan or degenerate internet forum that was around in the early days. Even this was a whole other level than what followed after "memes" got popular and even your mum sent you some with the rise of bored panda, 9gag etc. (Remember the fun times where memes could even mean gore on the front page? Unthinkable nowadays.) So even in the early days there was already a very heavy break with what I consider to be the first area to the second era. Afterwards they became way less edgy and less centered around the experiences of nerds who experienced heavy mobbing and were replaced with things like lolcats and stuff. The author is a bit late to the party imho. Normies took over meme culture, it's pop culture nowadays. Deal with it. Memes in the early days could be way darker than all this doomer stuff could ever be imho. I guess it also heavily depends on what memes you where consuming on what pages and communities. Even my experience is heavily subjective I guess.
• notacoward 5y ago
  A lot of comments here suggest that the author's just getting older. At 56, with a pretty strong appreciation of most memes, I think it's a bit more nuanced. It's not their appreciation of memes that declines as most people get older, but their tolerance for overuse. The first comparison I would make is to drinking. There's no stigma attached to binge drinking in college, but when somebody in their thirties is still doing it people start to view it with concern and/or distaste. Similarly, still being in Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra mode at that age is seen as a failure to advance in life. Really, it's all about appropriate vs. excessive use, and variety vs. monotony. The other comparison I'd make is to swearing. Some people - especially older people - don't want to hear any at all. At the other end of the spectrum are people who can't seem to get through a sentence without five F-bombs. Most folks go through a stage early on where they swear a lot, then learn that overuse dilutes swearing's impact. They learn other ways to express strong feeling and switch among them. Similarly, some people go through a stage of meme overuse before they learn to mix memes with other ways to get an idea or feeling across for best effect. (I particularly wish more tech presenters would hurry up and learn that BTW.) Memes are just one way to express yourself, and they're often a great way, but there are other ways too and they all work better when they're used to complement each other. I think the OP is working up to that realization.
• laughingbovine 5y ago
  Old man yells at cloud.
• EricE 5y ago
  lol - my Dad and his co-workers were faxing around cartoons and jokes in the 70's and 80's, and in previous decades I'm sure there were other ways of sharing humorous illustrations and sayings. There is nothing special about "memes" - the concept is as old as the bored office worker.
• tpoacher 5y ago
  There are three kinds of meme: 1. Genuinely insightful/funny 2. Meme as an opinion/argument 3. Bullying meme I'm ok with 1. I'm not ok with 3, but can see that it's unavoidable and invariably popular in less, let's call it, "educated" populations. An "educated" netizen not personally affected by the topic of bullying can typically simply choose to ignore these and move on. The worst on that list for me is 2. "Argument by meme", as well as "argument by comic" or "argument by videoclip" depicting contrived scenarios as fact seems to be extremely popular these days, and is one of the most insidious things on the internet.