Absurd edits of Vice President JD Vance have ballooned throughout social media within the week following the disastrous televised assembly between him, President Trump, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on the Oval Workplace final Friday, February 28. Latching onto Vance’s petulant and interruptive calls for that Zelensky thank america for its assist all through the lethal Russian invasion, customers on X, Instagram, and different platforms have short-circuited algorithms with an onslaught of yassified and chubbified variations of the vice chairman’s headshot or different documented appearances.
Starting from pictures that liken Vance to a universally acquainted rotund little boy who is simply too desirous to be the hallway line chief to those who make him the favored topic of DeviantArt-esque weight problems fetish artwork, the overarching theme of this meme cycle is a fixation over his physique and facial construction. Although there are just a few standard edits that render him as a lip filler diva who misplaced his hair alongside the best way, a Minion, and The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl in 3-D (2005) villain Mr. Electrical amongst different issues, the overwhelming majority of circulating pictures equate him to some kind of behemoth flesh mass with a Miley Cyrus 2008 Grammy Awards stare.
I favor these variations as they at the very least stay topical (Left: @DarkOddConspiracy on X; Proper: @selmacashmoney on X )
Please observe that I’m not coming at this from the identical angle as some did when accusing Greta Thunberg of body-shaming when she made enjoyable of Andrew Tate’s small dick vitality, however somewhat from a perspective of … “Okay, and?”
And I’ll completely admit that I laughed and favored just a few of the unique edits that got here up on my timeline earlier than realizing they may’ve irrevocably contaminated my algorithm, however at this level it’s simply the Gen Z iteration of “orange man bad!” or mentioning that Trump has tiny palms. Truthfully, the couch-sex memes have been far funnier and cleverer than this as a result of they attacked him on the very core of who he’s, somewhat than simply off-handed jokes that Vance is a few poster mannequin for kohl eyeliner. However the reality of the matter is that each tendencies are simply water off of a duck’s again for individuals like Vance who can solely snigger at watching us bodily and spiritually bleed out.
I don’t actually know when the memes took Vance’s hair away, nevertheless it positively intensifies the vibe. (by way of u/l2ksolkov on Reddit)
One X person known as to “set aside our differences, come together, and focus on bullying elon musk and jd vance into a type of body dysmorphia heretofore unseen by man.” However between Vance’s shamelessness and Musk’s alleged persistent ketamine daze, this on-line bullying doesn’t quantity to a lot. One other level is that simply as we made enjoyable of Musk’s barrel chest and 2012 Redditor mannerisms (see: Asperger’s Syndrome), now we’re warping Vance’s cruelty into one thing so past the unique drawback and blasting the hell out of it.
Whereas it’s virtually unimaginable to take Vance and Musk critically as their cringeworthy mannerisms don’t garner a lot public respect, this model of surface-level humor is simply too apathetic, a lukewarm coping mechanism meant to show our greatest threats into digestible jokes to be able to course of, compartmentalize, and even decrease the hurt they’re exacting on all sides of our lives. It’s a depressing try at “taking back our power,” or no matter.
Even with their monetary and political energy, Vance and Musk are precise losers. However in actuality, so are we in the intervening time, and we’re gonna should do even only a hair higher than rekindling early 2000s-caliber fat-shaming, autism insults, infantilization, and utilizing gender-bending (some memes depict Vance as a drag queen) because the butt of the joke to maintain our heads above water.
Truthfully, although, all of this meme-ing and even my candid, half-baked evaluation of it are simply two faces of the identical need, which is: “SOMEBODY (but not me), PLEASE DO SOMETHING ALREADY.”
Accumulate all of them to revive your human rights and monetary safety. (@GregoryGlimmer on X)
Eight months in the past this template was most likely used in opposition to Vance for the sofa allegations. Recycling turned digital due to Woke. (@TheFl0orIsLava on X)
Vance because the Butter Pants child from Shrek Without end After (2010) (@bandrui0 on X)
Not simply our algorithms, however our environment too. (@Mythotard on X)
Stopping right here so I can go to sleep nightmare-free tonight … (@captainburger64 on Instagram)
