What is a meme?
If you asked someone a few years ago what a meme was, they would probably look at you as if you had four eyes on your face. The concept of a meme came up a few years ago and ever since, has been a huge part of the internet culture. According to Tech Terms, “A meme is a concept or behavior that spreads from person to person. Examples of memes include beliefs, fashions, stories, and phrases” [1].
Richard Dawkins described 3 essential characteristics of memes: Fidelity, Fecundity and Longevity. When a meme has fidelity, it means that it has the ability to “hook” people into contributing their own version of the meme. Fecundity is when a meme has the ability to be transmitted, transformed, and modified. Lastly, longevity enables there to be memory within the meme.
Along with Dawkins three essential characteristics, there are three other additional characteristics that allow for a successful meme. The first one is that it needs to have humor. This characteristic is used to keep people constantly engaged. The second one is intertextuality. This one is the cross-references to a host of popular culture events, artifacts and practices through remixing practices. Lastly, there is juxtaposition. This maximizes the susceptibility of the idea being passed from mind to mind and is considered a part of the memes’ “hook”. When looking at the “Evil Kermit the Frog” meme, it carries all of the six essential characteristics of a meme and that is why it has been so famous throughout the internet.
Background
If you have never heard of the “Evil” Kermit the Frog meme, I am sure you have still stumbled across it on your Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook feed without realizing the meaning behind it. According to Know Your Meme, the popular meme originated in 2014 when the Muppets Most Wanted film was released. This film was where Kermit the Frog’s look-a-like character appeared “dressed in a black cloak” [2]. The website also states how the meme first gained its popularity: “On November 6th, 2016, a Twitter user tweeted a screenshot of Kermit the Frog standing next to a Sith version of himself with the caption ‘me: sees a fluffy dog / me to me: steal him’. Within 10 days, the tweet gained over 31,800 likes and 22,500 retweets” [2].
As the meme started gaining its popularity, everyone around the world started to retweet it. Soon after, people started taking the same picture that was on the meme and putting their own captions. Personalizing it. This is usually what happens in the world of memes because if someone likes the concept of it, they then want to make captions that themselves along with other can relate to and find humorous. With this popularity, it is evident that the meme would also undergo some other modifications. One of the most popular modifications this meme went through was becoming an “Evil” Miss Piggy meme, another well-known Muppets character, instead of the original Kermit the Frog meme. This once again allowed people the personalize the meme to make it more of their own.
Evil Kermit is a meme that depicts what appears to be a “good” Kermit and an “evil” Kermit talking to each other, with each Kermit representing opposing sides of one’s conscience. Evil Kermit is about your internal dialogue, frequently encouraging you to do things that might sound good, but probably aren’t a good idea.
Dictionary.com [3]
Where the problem is:
There are a lot of underlying reasons when it comes to why the rise to fame for the “Evil” Kermit the Frog meme was so immense. Yes, it is definitely funny and relatable to those on the internet but there are also a few cultural and sociological motivations of the meme itself. For one, it allows people to give a glimpse of what they are thinking personally. The main point of this meme is to portray what one is thinking at the moment along with what that “evil” side of you is also thinking at the same time. You can think of it as having an angel on one shoulder and a devil on the other.
The meme itself is an outlet for people to express their emotions. It enables for users to discretely post to the internet what they are feeling and thinking, good or bad. The best part of making memes is that being controversial is almost accepted. It’s a mechanism people utilize to get their opinion out there and at the end of the day, someone else is going to like what you have to say and relate to it. That is why the world of memes can be so good or so evil.
Citations
Citation 1: “Meme.” Meme Definition, 18 Nov. 2011, techterms.com/definition/meme.
Citation 2: “Evil Kermit.” Know Your Meme, 14 Jan. 2020, knowyourmeme.com/memes/evil-kermit.
Citation 3: Tudury, Leila. “What Does Evil Kermit Mean?” Dictionary.com, Dictionary.com, 23 Dec. 2019, http://www.dictionary.com/e/memes/evil-kermit/.
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