About

"Spicy Memes" is an ironic expression used to describe humorous online viral media and in-jokes, which is often used as an alternative to the phrase ”dank memes”.

Origin

On August 3rd, 2014, YouTuber NuLL uploaded a video of himself saying “that’s one spicy meme” (shown below).

Spread

On November 15th, 2014, the /r/spicymemes subreddit^[2] was launched. On February 10th, 2015, Yahoo Answers^[3] user Shift posted a question titled “My son is addicted to spicy memes?” (shown below, left). On March 22nd, Someecard^[4] user Shoemcgoo submitted an ecard with the caption “I’m about to show you a whole new world of spicy as fuck memes, kiddo” (shown below, right).

On March 15th, 2016, Urban Dictionary^[7] user Xheese juce created the first entry for “spicy meme,” defined as:

“Memes that are more than dank. They are the dankest of the dankest. They are so good that the burn your tongue. It’s spicy.”

On April 12th, Imgur^[6] user narwall101 uploaded a gallery of image macros titled “Spicy meme dump.” On April 28th, the Spicy Memes Facebook^[5][1] page was launched, garnering upwards of 481,000 likes over the next 10 months. On May 10th, the /r/Spicy_Memes^[8] subreddit was created. On September 3rd, YouTuber PewDiePie uploaded a video titled “Dank PewDiePie Spicy Memes,” highlighting various image macros using screen captures and photos of himself (shown below). Within five months, the video received more than 6.5 million views and 24,900 comments.

On February 24th, 2017, YouTuber Empire Supercars uploaded footage of MIT student Lilly Chen presenting the final Jeopardy! question “Who is the spiciest memelord?“ (shown below). Over the next 72 hours, the video garnered upwards of 875,900 views and 290 comments.

Search Interest

Throughout 2015, “spicy meme” entered widespread usage on multiple media-sharing platforms, including Facebook, Reddit and Tumblr, which is further evidenced by the exponential increase in search interest for the term during that year.

External References