Meme on

If you have a Facebook account (which, if you don’t, where have you been for the past five years?), you most definitely have seen the memes that have infiltrated everyone’s news feeds. Memes are usually photographic or illustrated puns, jokes and concepts that spread across the Internet.

Even IU has a collection of them, with jokes making fun of the bus system, Ballantine Hall’s staircases and more.

A currently popular meme takes a certain group of people, often a profession or some other cultural modifier, and portrays what different people think about that group.

For example, sorority girls could be a topic, with photos showing “what my parents think I do” and “what society thinks I do.” By creating this meme, users get the chance to not only make a joke about the way others view them, but also the way that they view themselves.

That being said, I think it is finally time to create one about the meme writers themselves. Because I am not nearly as talented at conveying my thoughts in pictures, I am going to write.

So here we go...

What society thinks I do: Create picture-based social statements about the way I should be viewed and how much more important than that I actually am. Also, adding to the immense quantity of quasi-art that bombards society with mindless blather.

What my professors think I do:  Sit in the back of my classes and play on my computer rather than listening to their fascinating lectures. Use my computer for evil, instead of taking meticulous notes on the pure glory pouring from their lips.

What my parents think I do: Go to school for $40,000 just to spend all of my time on my computer editing pictures together in the hopes of getting a few likes on my Facebook page.

They also worry as to what I am going to do with a gender studies degree when my only job experience is creating “photo-representations.”

What my friends think I do: Sit around all day and try to come up with the next thing to make them laugh. They also look on with skepticism as I laugh at my own creations when they fail to see the humor.

What I think I do: Create a photographic representation that encapsulates the difficulties and complexities of living life from my perspective, and the importance that my role in society actually holds, also making it available to the public so as to join together in brotherly solidarity with the others who live my lifestyle.

What I actually do: Copy. Paste. Chuckle to myself maniacally.

Finally, my own addition to this meme.

What I should be doing with the time I spend writing these memes: Studying, reading, learning a new language, traveling the world, writing the next great American novel, building a castle, finding true love or really anything else.

­— azoot@indiana.edu