About

Yas Bitch Slay refers to a four-panel exploitable image macro involving one character, oftentimes a parent or guardian, telling another character to change their outfit because it's not provocative enough. The first character then changes into a skimpier outfit, prompting the response, "Yas bitch slay," referencing LGBTQ+ lexicon and other memes like Yassification. The original meme was shared on Instagram in 2016. Its usage picked up in early 2022 as meme creators on Twitter referenced their own subcultures and fandoms within multiple iterations.

Origin

In August 2016, the Instagram^[1] page meme.cloud posted the original Yas Bitch Slay meme, using Shutterstock clip art images of a father and daughter having a conversation across four panels. The daughter is originally dressed modestly, covering up her body. The father, however, tells her, "Not dressed like that you aren't," causing her to change into a tube top and jean shorts. The dad then states, "Yas bitch slay," allowing her to go out to the party (shown below).

Although the original post has since been deleted, the earliest repost was shared on August 16th, 2016, by Tumblr ^[2] blog langsettttttte, where over the course of five years, the post received roughly 42,600 notes. It was also reposted by the Instagram^[3] page menotgivingafuck on August 21st, 2016, who gave direct credit to meme.cloud in the caption. Of course, a meme.cloud watermark can be seen in the bottom right-hand corner of the image.

Spread

On August 17th, 2016, the meme was then shared to Reddit's /r/youdontsurf^[4] where it received over 400 upvotes, further spreading. It was also shared on FunnyJunk^[5] in September 2017.

However, the template didn't take off in abundance until January 2022, inspired by multiple memes using the template on Twitter. On January 27th, 2022, Twitter^[6] user Ingeboborga posted the first known version, editing in fan art of the characters Morax and Barbatos from the video game Genshin Impact, earning roughly 37,900 likes over the course of one week (shown below).

More Twitter users jumped onto the trend going into February. For instance, on January 28th, 2022, Twitter^[7] user nagrimgrim posted a meme that referenced Naruto, receiving roughly 35,100 likes in one week (shown below, left). On January 30th, another Genshin Impact meme was made using the template, posted by Twitter^[8] user _riki0928 who earned roughly 22,100 likes in five days (shown below, right).

More users emerged with their own versions of the template, referencing other fandoms like those of Ace Academy^[9] and Twisted Wonderland,^[10] among others.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References