About

Putting on Clown Makeup, also known as Clown Makeup Tutorial refers to a series of memes based on a step-by-step tutorial guide for applying clown makeup. The format gained initial popularity on Twitter in June 2019 and spread to Reddit, Tumblr and other social networks in the following months, usually used to illustrate a person making an increasingly larger fool of himself by providing arguments which are deemed increasingly weak or illogical.

Origin

On October 28th, 2015, YouTube channel SmiffysFancyDress posted a video titled "Male Clown Make-up Tutorial" in which a five-step tutorial for applying clown makeup was shown.^[1] As of September 5th, 2019, the video had over 5,800 views on the platform.

On May 21st, 2019, Facebook^[6] user Trash Bin published the earliest known version of the meme, which consisted of several still images from the video and featured levels describing various communist nations. The post received more than 4,900, shares, 1,000 reactions and 180 comments in less than two years (shown below).

Spread

On June 13th, 2019, Twitter user @m6sloth posted the earliest viral instance of the meme outside of Facebook, illustrating a person defending the decision not to include full roster of Pokémon in Pokémon Sword and Shield. ^[2] The tweet gained over 240 retweets and 900 likes in the three months.

In the following months, the format received further spread on Twitter,^[3] Tumblr^[4] and Reddit,^[5] usually used to mock people offering unpopular opinions by comparing them with clowns.

Various Examples

Templates

Search Interest

External References