Revelation

For better or worse, my generation will be remembered for our memes. More than our achievements, or contributions to the civic dialogue, it is the birth of viral internet content which has both shaped our development and defined our legacy.

Google Trends results for the term “meme”

As google trends confirms, the term “meme” came to age just as we did. And as we have grown, entered college, and started careers, those memes have themselves matured. With age, they have trended away from the light hearted, and towards the intimately miserable. As one of my peers aptly wrote, “my generation is going to be known for wanting to die and memes.”

With respect to his intentions, however, I don’t view these two traits as exclusive. Our memes don’t merely parallel our desperation — they reflect it. In a world where suicide rates are climbing, where debt is unavoidable, and where the future is brutally uncertain, sanity demands trivialization. We have no choice but to laugh at our misery, to alienate ourselves from uncomfortable truths. We have no choice but to seek the solidarity of utter desperation.

Max Ernst (1891–1976) — ‘Murdering Airplane’ 1920 (photomontage)

We aren’t the first to face such a fate, nor the first to respond with absurd humor. In the aftermaths of world wars one and two, Dadaism, or the art of the absurd, grew in direct proportion to misery. Veterans who had seen men torn apart without explanation, whose friends had died for no discernible cause, wrote poetry without meaning and painted portraits without substance. If men can die for nothing, if countries can be torn apart without cause, then why shouldn’t planes have arms?

In a world where so many suffered for so little reason, the absurd brought sense to the senseless.

Now, it would be unfair to suggest that I have faced anywhere near the horrors of war, but the lives of my generation have been far from easy. I grew up being told of inequity and of coming climate disaster, only to watch both accelerate as I grew. I was told that our society was progressing only to watch my friends kicked out of their homes for being trans, and to hear tales of my peers being poisoned in mines and factories overseas. I was told my parents would solve the climate crisis, only to watch my home city burn. I was told our future would be bright, only to face the suicide of one friend, and the murder of another.

We who were promised justice are mocked for defending it, and have all but surrendered to senseless, pervasive desperation.

Last year, 8 million tons of plastic were dumped in the oceans. Last year, 80 tons of dead fish coated the shores of Ha Tinh, Vietnam. Last year, one in four children were underfed in the wealthiest nation in the history of the world. Last year Student Loan debt passed 1.4 trillion dollars. Last year a company was founded selling our blood as an anti aging treatment. Last year, half of millennials admitted they would trade the right to vote for loan forgiveness. Last year, more than 10,000 young people in the United States took their own lives.

In response to this senseless suffering, our memes have themselves become senseless. Alongside absurd “trebuchet” and “garlic bread” memes, whose popularity stems from their baseless nature, online communities like 2meirl4meirl consist entirely of half-satirical pleas for death. Even still, suicide memes do have a point. Their answer, while horrific, is still an answer. The most radically absurd memes, the memes which tell us the most about ourselves, are those of complete meaninglessness. Not unlike their Dadaist roots, these memes don’t mock reality as such; they mock the idea that any consistent and just reality exists. The appeal of personalities like Spooderman or Mr. Skeltal offer no insights on the human condition, nor do they have concrete origins. They simply exist for the sake of existing. And in their meaninglessness, they reflect a reality without meaning.

Mr. Skeltal in the flesh

A “meme” is often defined as any viral, or pervasive idea. More than a picture or clever caption, memes speak to something deeper about the world we inhabit. As such, Dadaist memes, or memes which treat suicide as a joke, are more than senseless or unfortunate artifacts of our time — they speak directly to the core of my generation’s identity. More than our technology or our beliefs, more than our tastes in fashion or in music, more than our culture or our communities, we are defined by senseless, pervasive, and self-aware desperation.

Our journey of survival in this world of malevolent apathy will not be told through articles or poems. No Orwell or Dickens could articulate the raw dread which we share. If future generations tell our story, they will not look beyond reddit, tumblr, or facebook. No, the story of this generation, of death, of crisis, of degradation, of filicide, of hopelessness, of absurdity — our story, will be told through memes.