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This Instagram Account Celebrates Hilariously Sarcastic Memes, Here Are 50 Of The Best
Oscar Wilde once said, "Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit but the highest form of intelligence." Regardless, PR experts and marriage counselors often advise their clients to stay away from it. The reason is simple: this form of expression can sting others, hurting people and harming relationships. As a communication tool, it dances on the edge of conflict.
But sometimes, throwing sparks and seeing if they catch fire is precisely what you want. Especially when everyone and everything around you tickles your nerves. Which is something we all sometimes feel. (I hope.)
So let's take a look at the Instagram account 'Sarcasm Only.' Sharing memes, tweets, and all kinds of content, it manages to pinpoint universal human emotion despite firing shots in every direction. If there's one place you need to get through a lousy, it's this little corner of the internet. I mean, why else would 16 million people follow it?
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In fact, scientists are finding that the ability to detect sarcasm really is useful. For the past 20 years, linguists, psychologists, neurologists, and other researchers have been analyzing our ability to perceive snarky remarks and gaining new insights into how the mind works. Their studies have shown that exposure to sarcasm enhances creative problem solving, for instance.
You could say sarcasm detection is an essential skill if one is going to function in a modern society dripping with irony. "Our culture, in particular, is permeated with sarcasm,” Katherine Rankin, a neuropsychologist at the University of California at San Francisco, told Smithsonian Magazine. "People who don't understand sarcasm are immediately noticed. They're not getting it. They're not socially adept."
Sarcasm is so popular in 21st-century America that according to one study of a database of telephone conversations, 23 percent of the time that the phrase "Yeah, right" was used, it was uttered sarcastically.
Entire phrases have almost lost their literal meanings because they are so frequently said with a sneer. Take "Big deal," for example. When was the last time someone said that to you and actually meant it? "My heart bleeds for you" almost always equals "Tell it to someone who cares," and "Aren’t you special" means you aren’t.
"It's practically the primary language in modern society," John Haiman, a linguist at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the author of Talk is Cheap: Sarcasm, Alienation and the Evolution of Language, said.
Let's start normalizing the fact that clothes are really expensive and deserve to be worn more than once!
Sarcastic statements are sort of a true lie. People are saying something they don’t literally mean, but the communication works as intended only if their listener gets that they're insincere.
Some language experts suggest sarcasm is used as a sort of gentler insult, a way to tone down criticism, but their opponents have found that the mocking, smug, superior nature of sarcasm is perceived as more hurtful than a plain-spoken criticism.
The Greek root for sarcasm, sarkazein, means to tear flesh like dogs. Haiman thinks dog-eat-dog sarcastic commentary is just part of our quest to be cool. "You're distancing yourself, you're making yourself superior. If you're sincere all the time, you seem naive."
I was going to comment something smart but I'm so tired. I'll do it tomorrow.
Research has also shown that sarcasm can be easily misinterpreted, especially when served electronically. In one study, 30 pairs of university students were given a list of statements to communicate, half of which were sarcastic and half of which were serious: some students communicated their messages via e-mail and others via voice recordings.
Participants who received the voice messages accurately gleaned the sarcasm (or lack thereof) 73 percent of the time, but those who received the statements via e-mail did so only 56 percent of the time, hardly better than chance. Additionally, the e-mailers had anticipated that 78 percent of participants would pick up on the sarcasm inherent in their sarcastic statements. That is, they badly overestimated their ability to communicate their tone.
At least sarcasm goes well with memes!
Those were the days. Spending all night reading...simpler times.
According to my dietician the worst thing you can do is eat or drink on an empty stomach, at least that's what I understood when I read her list of do's and don'ts.
POV: When your friend brings one of their other friends to lunch but you don't know the other friend so you just sit there awkwardly while they reminisce about something they did 4 years ago.
But if you were stranded somewhere in danger at 3am and needed them you know they’d come.
my bestie picked my up at a trainstation 250 km from home because there was a huge storm and trains were canceled.. it was 0:30am when he arrived and i coudn't be more thankful to have him
Load More Replies...And even after a whole year you can start the conversation just where you left it and be sure they understand your twisted mind
this literally happened to me, we stopped texting during the year of virtual school, ran into each other during orientation, she complimented my hair and made a dark joke
Load More Replies...Called really close friend I hadn't seen for about a year crying saying I really needed a friend. She hung up. Half hour later she is at front door in her PJ's she had hung up to jump straight in car, not even getting dressed. Felt blessed
I do see my besties more often than that and we still don't have photos together. I've been friends with one of them for approx 20 years.
had one friend since 1975 - don't think we have any either.
Load More Replies...I went to Disneyland Paris just before Christmas and took 5 pictures. Last weekend I went to IKEA and took 47. Enough said.
remember "friends help you move house, but good friends help you move bodies"
I'm actually really trying to take photos with my friends because we're so busy having fun everyone forgets lol
This is 100% me and my bestie of over 25 years. The only pictures of us together were taken at our weddings. We are both divorced now, lol!!!
I haven't seen my best friend in person in 30 years. How many pictures should I have? 😉
I believe I've achieved that and I'm super happy about it. I like being a mythical creature that pops into friends' lives sporadically and their friends say "I've been hearing about you for >insert amount of time< and I was starting to think you didn't exist." A sentence like that is music to my ears.
I hope it's not a chili pepper cake, because you don't need the extra burn.
Well yeah that's why its called "after work". I don't exist to the outside world after 8pm.
Yup, rich will do that to you. All the money in the world for surgery, injections, make-up and photoshop.
Note: this post originally had 95 images. It’s been shortened to the top 50 images based on user votes.
I'm sat here trying to figure out if the person that put these together actually knows what sarcasm is.
I'm sat here trying to figure out if the person that put these together actually knows what sarcasm is.