Being a Meme Ruined my Life…
Memes are a viral phenomenon where images or videos are shared on social media platforms usually with a funny caption or punchline. They become super-viral reaching millions, being shared, liked, and reposted over and over again. Therefore if a meme goes viral overnight, more often than not, the person featuring in the meme goes viral with it, turning them into an internet celebrity overnight, and making them one of the most recognizable people on the internet for a period of time, especially if the meme trends on Youtube or Twitter for example. This fame is different from other internet fame, as usually the person who is the subject of the meme does not know they are a meme, and has not given permission for their photo or video to be used, therefore they have not asked for the popularity and fame they receive.
Becoming a viral meme has really changed some people's lives, for good and for bad. Mason Ramsey became a meme in 2018 when a video went viral of him yodeling in a Walmart store in America, he became known as ‘The Walmart Yodelling Kid’.
The meme changed his life dramatically, and he became the most famous boy in the world for a short space of time, becoming recognizable everywhere. For Mason, this meme positively impacted his life as many opportunities opened up for him following the success of his meme. He got to perform on the main stage at Coachella that year; one of the biggest music festivals in the world, and got to meet some of the biggest people in the music industry (him with Justin Bieber in the picture above).
However, the story is sadly not the same for all those who get famous through viral memes. ‘#AlexfromTarget’ became a viral meme on Twitter in 2014, and the subject of the meme was a 17-year-old boy called Alex who was a cashier in Target who had his picture taken due to a girl finding him good looking and posting him on Twitter. This image blew up overnight, and Alex’s following went up to nearly 1million. However this excitement and fame was short-lived as many people turned on him in a storm of internet hate, calling him gay, and sending him and his family death threats, Alex said in interviews he struggled a lot with his mental health during this time. Eventually, the police had to get involved due to people releasing his family's bank details and home address online, causing the family to receive a surplus of harassment and ruining their lives. Therefore in this case becoming a viral meme really did change this boy, and his family's life, when they didn't even ask for this level of fame or even give permission for the photo of him to be published online.
