About

"Listen Here You Little Shit", sometimes spelled "Listen Here, U Lil Shit", is an expression typically used to preface an angry rebuttal in discussion forums and imageboards online. In comments, the phrase can be also iterated in the form of reaction images in which various characters are shown with a pointed finger gesture as if they are about to make an objection, the most notable instance featuring British actor Matt Smith as the Eleventh Doctor in the BBC sci-fi TV series Doctor Who.

Origin

The first known online use of the phrase can be traced to a quote posted by Neoseeker forum member The Crow in a professional wrestling role-playing thread on July 3rd, 2004.

Hurricane fake laughs at Tony's remarks before punching him in the gut.

Hurricane: Now listen here you little shit, you will tell me where
this is headin', and you will do it before I have to harm you anymore.
Tony: It's going… to… [takes breath] the nWo locker room.
Hurricane: I see, well then it wouldn't be complete without some Hurri-touches.

Precursors

The term "you little shit" has been used as a derogatory label for many decades, with the earliest notable reference found in the lyrics of Pink Floyd's symphonic rock song "The Trial" from the band's 1979 rock opera concept album The Wall.

You little shit, you're in it now, I hope they throw away the key.

In Hollywood cinema, the phrase gained its notoriety as a memorable quote said by the protagonist character Helen (portrayed by Sarah Michelle Gellar) in the 1997 horror thriller film I Know What You Did Last Summer.

Helen: Listen, you little shit-stick-mayberry-ass reject. There's been a murder, and you are going to fry in hell if you ignore it!

Spread

On June 30th, 2006, the expression was used again by Neoseeker forum member First Class Soldier in yet another pro-wrestling-themed role-playing thread. On May 22nd, 2007, Urban Dictionary user Carliann submitted the first definition entry for the phrase "you little shit." On November 6th, 2011, the phrase was featured as a humorous fake quotation attributed to German Chancellor Angela Merkel on the satirical news and commentary blog Ship In The Night^[1] in an article about the impact of Greece's recession on the rest of the European economy. On November 1st, 2012, NeoGAF forum member Satch wrote "listen you little shit" in response to another member's criticism of Marvel comicbook illustrator Jerome Opena in a discussion thread^[2] about comic books. About a month later, on December 14th, the earliest known use of the phrase in an image macro came in a holiday-themed eCard submitted by SomeEcards user Damnedestday^[3] (shown below).

In late 2012, various examples of the catchphrase began to surface on Deviant Art ^[4], and in the following years, the phrase made its way onto Imgur as a commonly used title for animal-themed animated GIFs, including one of an elephant scolding an ostrich^[5], which has gained over 430,000 views and 5,100 upvotes, and another one of two gorillas interacting with each other^[6], which has garnered over 810,000 views and 4,800 upvotes.

Various Examples

Dr. Who Derivatives

In April 2013, a discussion thread was submitted to the r/pics subreddit about the U.S. Goverment Shutdown. On April 8th, Redditor minipump posted an unflattering screenshot of The Doctor (played by Matt Smith) from the BBC sci-fi TV series Doctor Who along with the caption "LISTEN HERE YOU LITTLE SHIT"^[7] (shown below, left). That same year, another user made a macro of the image, featuring the shorthand phrase "Listen here U lil shit" (shown below, right).

They led to a slew of parodies involving that character.

Following its popularity as a reaction image, a further edit was created by associating another screenshot from the same episode, episode 8th of the 7th season titled Rings of Akhaten, depicting The Doctor fixing his bow tie and the Descriptive Noise caption "[angrily fixes bow tie]" underneath. It led to more 2-panes parodies:

Chicken Kiev Variations

On October 10th, 2019, Redditor RealComradeMeep used the Chicken Kiev Heavy Halloween customization from Team Fortress 2 as an image macro paired with the phrase "listen here you little shit" to r/dankmemes^[19] (show below, left). The post received over 42,000 points (94% upvoted). On October 23rd, Redditor mijuzz7 posted another variation of the image macro to r/memes^[20] which accumulated over 9,100 points (86% upvoted) in two weeks. The next day, the same Redditor posted another variation to r/memes^[21] which gained over 61,100 points (92% upvoted) in two weeks.

Search Interest

External References