this post was submitted on 30 Oct 2023
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Memes

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[–] [email protected] 37 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I think that OP's sentiment is more against gatekeeping what a meme is. Like if this is a meme, than political cartoons are too

[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Defining words properly isn't gatekeeping, it's categorization.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Well, defining words narrowly is pretty much the definition of gatekeeping. I hope you're not gatekeeping what gatekeeping means?

[–] [email protected] 20 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

You aren't a real gatekeeper if you haven't gatekept gatekeeping before

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

Ah yes, no true gatekeeper.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Defining things properly isn't gatekeeping. You said narrow. I didn't.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

But who decides what the proper definition is? Your proper definition is for me a narrow if it doesn't take into account the common usage. The definition of meme is widening. Cope with it.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I'm perfectly happy to give orthographic dominion to Webster. They can be our Academie Francaise. They can control the definition drift. And the pedants can use their educational privilege to suppress the poors. As it should be.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

As it has always been. As God himself intended it as we see in the story of the tower of babel

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago (3 children)
[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

Not only is it a great origin, that's a fantastic article on it

Thank you so much for sharing

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Literally all the things here including comments are memes.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago

Correct

So basically what I'm saying is that there's a lot of people gatekeeping what a meme is without understanding what a meme is

Or if they're referring to the first of the definitions in the screenshot I shared, not understanding that different people can find things humorous

The biggest meme of all is our spoken languages

[–] [email protected] -2 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

I didn't say they weren't. I just reject the notion that proper definitions aren't gatekeeping. I'm not joining the above argument. I understand the definition is based on usage and the usage has changed. Most humans are morons and don't know how to use words properly so they let language change over time.