Memes arent actually from the Internet, only this particular form of text on a picture meme is. And that particular style has historical precursors in actual physical newspapers.
A good way to think of them is a shared in-joke repeated. If you and your friends keep making the same joke, that’s a meme. Yo mama jokes are a meme.
The Wilhelm scream in films is a meme. It’s often used as a joke by sound designers and done so repeatedly by practically everyone in the industry.
Also memes are just equivalent to ‘in-jokes’ you have with your friends. I imagine it’s not possible to dislike all jokes entirely (save some neurodivergence I guess idk) but it’s normal to have preferences. I imagine you would need to find the right memes for you, or be part of the culture and communities where they’re coming from to help provide context.
Memes are a thing of the internet.
We never had them growing up.
There’s not too much difference between a meme and a single panel comic or political cartoon at this point.
“Meme” had a much narrower definition not that long ago…
Are you only allowed to like things that you liked when you were growing up?
Memes arent actually from the Internet, only this particular form of text on a picture meme is. And that particular style has historical precursors in actual physical newspapers.
A good way to think of them is a shared in-joke repeated. If you and your friends keep making the same joke, that’s a meme. Yo mama jokes are a meme.
The Wilhelm scream in films is a meme. It’s often used as a joke by sound designers and done so repeatedly by practically everyone in the industry.
Also memes are just equivalent to ‘in-jokes’ you have with your friends. I imagine it’s not possible to dislike all jokes entirely (save some neurodivergence I guess idk) but it’s normal to have preferences. I imagine you would need to find the right memes for you, or be part of the culture and communities where they’re coming from to help provide context.
You absolutely had memes growing up, they just weren’t called that at the time (or they were, but not popularized as such).
Go read Richard Dawkins’ “Meme: The selfish gene” (1976)