About

Why Are You Scared? Isn't This What You Wanted? is a catchphrase that is often used as a humorous caption in image macros for photographs of people wearing anime girl masks. Memes using the format draw humor from the theoretical situation in which one's waifu becomes real, likely causing the uncanny valley effect and aversion in the person who adores her.

Origin

On June 25th, 2020, Redditor Abdiel76767 posted a meme combining a photograph of a group of cosplayers wearing anime schoolgirl masks and the caption "Why are you scared, isn't this what you wanted?" The post (shown below) received over 21,000 upvotes in the /r/animemes^[1] subreddit in six months.

Spread

In the following weeks, the image received viral spread online through multiple reposts. For example, on June 26th, 2020, Instagram^[2] user anime_healthcenter reposted the image, with the repost gaining over 13,800 likes in 10 months. A June 27th repost by Instagram^[3] user big_chungles gained over 32,600 likes in the same period.

On July 12th, 2020, Redditor^[4] TakingASipp posted the first derivative meme using the caption, combining it with an image of Love Live! – School Idol Project cosplayer wearing a mask of character Honoka Kosaka. The post received over 800 upvotes in six months (shown below, left). On July 26th, Redditor SuperSuccGirl69 posted an image of an Inugami Korone cosplayer paired with the caption that received over 700 upvotes in /r/okbuddybaka^[5] subreddit in the same period (shown below, right).

On August 12th, 2020, Redditor^[6] Mifil_ made the earliest known post that used the catchphrase differently from the previous examples, a grand strategy meme (shown below, left). On September 12th, Redditor^[7] joedabst posted meme that received over 58,700 upvotes in the /r/memes subreddit in six months (shown below, right).

In late 2020 and in 2021, the catchphrase maintained popularity online, used as a caption for memes and independently.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References