Brushie Brushie Brushie

About

BRUSHIE BRUSHIE BRUSHIE is an exploitable image macro meme involving the practice of adding a hand with a toothbrush to other images. Beginning on January 7th, “Brushie Brushie Brushie” pages began appearing all over 4chan’s /b/. The primary image used in the meme is one of a bat being cleaned with a toothbrush.

Origin

On January 28th, 2008, Mandi Griffith created a Facebook Photo Album called Baby Bats. One photo in particular, of a baby bat named Rubberlegs with the caption, “Rubberlegs enjoying a brush with his blue toothbrush” was also added to the public Facebook group Bats!!!, which featured a collection of 95 user-sourced bat photos.

It’s not entirely clear who was first to take the photo from the Facebook Group, but it was posted in a few different blogs before becoming 4chan’s “Brushie Brushie Brushie” meme. If you have information/media regarding origins of this meme, feel free to contribute to research.

Spread

One place the photo appeared was on the blog I have seen the whole internet posted on October 20th, 2009.

This was reblogged on Motor Coconut on November 3rd, 2009.

The image was later used as a part of this post on DailyKos on November 23rd.

On 4chan

As of yet, the exact date of origin and the circumstances behind the phrase “brushie brushie brushie” becoming attached to the meme are unknown, but it seems to have occurred some time late in the first week or early in the 2nd week of January, 2010.

One email sent to KYM suggests that it was part of a Post Ending in X declaration, but the archived thread has yet to be found. Lacking a screenshot of the thread, this is not to be taken as proof of a GET-decided name, but is an anecdote that would support that theory.

So far a few threads have been submitted to 4chanarchive.org, but none reveal the GET. Being that it was only a double digit GET, it is no surprise that the thread went unarchived.

Adult Swim Forums

On January 10th, 2010, Adult Swim Forums user Crenshaw Pete started three threads in the Incoherent Babbling board referencing BRUSHIE BRUSHIE BRUSHIE.

• MORNING TURBO CAPSLOCK PARTY
• BRUSHIE BRUSHIE BRUSHIE
• Post a random Meme Thread

Memegenerator

There has also been a Brushie Brushie Brushie Memegenerator, but it is currently on a very low Tier.

Y.T.M.N.D.

• On December 16, 2006, greenbanana created brushy brushy brushy brushy brushy well before any of the prior “Brushie” meme had happened.

• On January 10th, Spocksbeard created Brushie! Brushie! Brushie! borrowing the same audio that greenbanana had used.

• January 12th, annoyingmau5 created brushie, currently the most viewed instance.

• January 15th, sea created Flying Brushie.

Google Insights

Searches for “Brushie Brushie Brushie” begin showing up on January 8th, 2010, peaking on January 16th, beginning a gradual fall:

Observations

Similar to Yo Dawg and Imma Let You Finish, there are examples of people creating remarkably similar derivatives independent of one another.