About

Parallel Lines refers to an exploitable image demonstrating the definition of parallel lines, two lines which are the same distance apart and never touch. In the exploitable edits, the lines are labeled different things to make a humorous point about how two different objects never intersect.

Origin

On January 29th, 2018, Redditor shadesofgabe uploaded an image of parallel lines to /r/dankmemes,^[1] making a "mods are gay" joke typical to the subreddit. The post gained over 21,000 upvotes (shown below).

Spread

Over the following day, the several users of the subreddit began creating images with the template. However, many of the posts using the template were made commenting on how it seemed unlikely the template would grow popular. Hours after the first post began getting popular on the subreddit, Redditor RodYT^[2] uploaded a meta version to /r/dankmemes mocking the subreddit, gaining over 4,400 upvotes (shown below, left). Redditor Omrriii^[3] uploaded a joke about how the format was destined to be quickly overused, gaining over 180 upvotes (shown below, right).

Meanwhile, the format began trending on /r/MemeEconomy. Several posts on the subreddit reposted the original image. The most popular gained over 100 upvotes.^[4] shadesofgabe, the poster of the original image in /r/dankmemes, posted a template in /r/MemeEconomy that gained over 30 upvotes (shown below, left). Another popular post in the subreddit made a joke about rotating text in MS paint, gaining over 40 upvotes (shown below, right).

Various Examples

Search Interest

Unavailable

External References