About

Jim Downey Asks to Clarify refers to a series of memes based on a skit from the podcast "Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend" in which guest Jim Downey refers to sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein as "New York Financier." In the memes, Downey refers to people famous for their crimes and misdeeds by their occupation.

Origin

On September 25th, 2023, comedy writer Jim Downey made an appearance on Conan O'Brien's podcast "Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend." The episode opens with Downey making an elaborate joke, a part of which is him pretending not to be aware of Jeffrey Epstein's sex trafficking case and death, and instead referring to him as "New York Financier." The episode garnered over 414,000 views on YouTube^[1] in three months.

- Jim, hold on! Much have been said about Jeffrey Epstein! Terrible things have been said!
- No, I'm talking about Jeffrey Epstein the New York financier.

On December 26th, 2023, X^[2] / Twitter user @SLURMK_ posted an image of Jim Downey from the podcast episode captioned, "Theodore Kaczynski, the mathematician?" referring to recognizing Ted Kaczynski not for his bombings, but instead for his mathematical career. The post received over 1,100 reposts and 23,000 likes in two days.

Spread

The viral spread of the post on X was followed by more similar memes posted in the following hours. For example, on December 26th, 2023, X^[3] user @LiamFennessy_ made a joke about allegations against baseball player Wander Franco, which received over 250 reposts and 4,700 likes in one day (shown below, left). Also that day, X^[4] user @pissboymcgee made a post about former Subway spokesman Jared Fogle, a convicted sexual predator, which gained over 180 reposts and 7,600 likes in one day (shown below, right).

More memes based on the format were posted on X in late December 2023.

Various Examples

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Search Interest

External References