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What Is 'Piper Perri Surrounded'? The Infamous 'White Couch Meme' And Its Origins Explained
During the 2016-2017 meme season, there was one image that was undoubtedly "the GOAT," which featured the adult film star Piper Perri sitting on a white couch surrounded by five men standing behind her — aptly named "Piper Perri Surrounded."
A simple image, only using a natural striking contrast to get its meaning across, and yet one that relies on subtext to truly appreciate. If you've seen this meme before but never knew the context, let's explain a bit of its history, where it comes from, how it's used in memes and why it continues to see use nearly a decade later.
Where Does 'Piper Perri Surrounded' Come From?
On October 9th way back in 2015, an adult parody version of the Netflix series Orange Is The New Black was released on the website Collette.com and starred Piper Perri in a racially motivated group physical exchange, which was dubbed "Or*y Is the New Black."
Before getting into the "team bonding exercise," an establishing shot showing Perri, a white couch and five Black men behind her was made. A year later, it would then become a massive viral phenomenon.
How Did The Still From The Video Become A Meme Format?
Months later in January 2016, an anonymous user on 9GAG posted the first meme transforming the image into a joke via object labeling. The still of Piper Perri surrounded by the group of guys humorously depicts financial struggles, with labels such as "Student Loan," "Business Life," "Bills," "Rent" and "Bank Account" assigned to the men, while Perri represented the individual in the situation.
From there, others online began using the format as it continued to spread to new sites and platforms around the internet, particularly on Reddit where dozens of examples were posted over the following months.
How Is 'Piper Perri Surrounded' Used In Memes?
Online, with the given context of knowing that the person on the white couch is going to be intimately roughed up in some form by the group standing behind them, the image was used primarily with object-labeling jokes, which would often lead to people editing themselves as the one soon to be manhandled, with their opps being the ones about to start the encounter.
This is best shown in examples with a lot of shared experiences, such as paying taxes or making pop culture references where a character is about to be destroyed.
As the format continued to evolve and be increasingly used as a reference image, memes became more detached, minimalist and also incorporated other references to internet culture, such as renditions remaking it with characters from Loss.
What Is The 'White Couch' Meme?
After some time, with the rise of redraw memes, it became common to draw characters from a show or movie in the same scene, with only the white couch and poses being the sole elements to clue people in on the meme.
This made the "White Couch" from the Piper Perri meme into the modern-day version of the Casting Couch, with the joke instantly being understood through that context by anyone who'd come across it before.
For the full history of Piper Perri surrounded, be sure to check out Know Your Meme's encyclopedia entry for more information.
