If you’ve been on the same parts of the internet as me in the past few weeks, you may have noticed a certain meme going around about a “solo poly amputee hijabi.” This joke’s original posts received many millions of views on X, formerly known as Twitter, and endless references on other apps. It is based on an Instagram infographic from deep in 2020. The original poster, @MarjaniLane, hoped to educate people on what it means to be “solo polyamorous” alongside a drawing of a black disabled hijabi woman. The reason people are talking so heavily about a random obscure post from four years ago has mostly been to ridicule it as an example of the absurdity of “wokeness.” The merits of these jokes aren’t the point.
What’s really interesting about this story is how it has developed over time. At one point, jokes and references to this post were real commentary on perceived trends in society. But they eventually devolved into self-satisfying meta references meant for an increasingly small audience. This isn’t just the case with one meme, but it has become the final destination for many jokes on the internet. Humor has changed on the internet recently, and the reasons why show us something very important about the nature of our culture.
To take a step back, it’s important to look at the entire timeline of this meme’s popularity from beginning to end through a few key posts. First, the resurgence and repurposing of the image into what it is now came from X user @QuetzalPhoenix, a right-wing content creator, making fun of the original post. Five layers of diversity was too much for this page’s fanbase, who went into a frenzy commenting how these types of people were invading white nations and giving the post over 33.5 million views. At that point, the meaning of the joke rapidly dispersed, with more left-leaning viewers using the opportunity to take jabs at the shallow and forced nature of “woke” internet discourse from the 2020 era. At this point, the joke is still about perceived trends in society with substance.
However, this quickly changed as it started to become combined with other popular memes to create an amalgamation of jokes, which one viral TikTok showcased with the text: “When I’m in a queen never cry lookalike competition at Charli XCX epilepsy square and my opponent is a solo poly hijabi amputee who’s holding space for Defying Gravity.” If you read that and didn’t understand a word, that’s okay, because that’s the whole point. In this one absurd sentence, it is possible to discern exactly five distinct memes that exist on related parts of the internet right now, and the entire “joke” is simply in recognizing them.
What this means is that people are instantly separated into two groups upon seeing something like that: those who get it and those who don’t. The humor is only for those who get it, and the joke is that they do. It is commentary simply on the nature of being so “chronically online” that one is able to decipher the meaning of a sentence with such seemingly disparate parts. As one X user commented, “you can’t miss a week on this website bro wtf are we talking about anymore.” This whole bit is meant to leave some people confused and others feeling gratified at their esoteric internet knowledge. It is self-satisfying and purposefully exclusive with the sole purpose being that it communicates that one is part of a certain in-group.
This is how internet humor functions nowadays; the lifecycle of a joke always eventually ends with the punchline pointed at itself and, in a way, the people that don’t get it. The reasons for and the consequences of this are multiple. For starters, humor is and has always been a method of connecting with other people. However, in our increasingly disconnected society, it is more difficult for people in our generation to forge genuine connections and find examples of community. This, combined with the current rise in the supplantation of real forms of identity with shallower online labels, creates a situation in which understanding absurd jokes like those above is becoming core to people’s understanding of themselves and how they relate to others. Alongside the fact that people online have an implicit goal to differentiate themselves and secure their individuality, this all combines to result in an exclusionary aspect to jokes like this. It becomes a race to make the most absurd string of references and speak in the most indecipherable code as a means of ensuring oneself passage into a select group of people. In the end, the joke is devalued because it is commodified as a means of establishing social hierarchies.
When we look at the “point” of humor in its many forms, the ideal is to speak to something “real” and generally improve people’s well being. When taking into account this new type of humor, it appears to do neither below the surface level. It’s worth noting that fact and looking past the basic, towards a more powerful and real form of humor that can better serve and bring us joy.