The “And I Took That Personally…” meme features an interview screenshot of basketball legend Michael Jordan from the set of the Emmy-winning 2020 ESPN docuseries The Last Dance. The image has been used to signify a tiny offense taken toward another party.
The meme is often also used replacing Michael Jordan's face with that of a popular figure or pop culture character.
"...And I Took That Personally" origins
The Last Dance first aired on ESPN from April 19 to May 17, 2020. The docuseries covers the 1997-98 Chicago Bulls and the drama surrounding their championship, specifically Michael Jordan’s place within the context of the story.
During the series, Jordan describes several moments from that season and period of his life that he took personally, typically within the context of basketball performance. It’s usually implied that Jordan used such personal slights as motivation in games.
Did Michael Jordan actually say "And I Took That Personally"?
No. “And I took that personally” is a case of the Mandela effect in full swing. That being said, Jordan expressed the sentiment of that phrase multiple times during The Last Dance.
On June 8th, 2020, YouTuber DoubleDuck posted a compilation of all the times Jordan admitted to taking something personally throughout the docuseries, none of which include the notorious phrase. The video garnered over 3.3 million views.
The meme itself began on May 17th, 2020, the day the finale of The Last Dance aired. On that day, Twitter user @OGMelo_ posted a "Nobody:" joke about the sheer amount of times Jordan took things personally in the docuseries. The post gathered 16k retweets and 78k likes.
Spread of "...And I took that personally"
In the aftermath of that initial @OGMelo_ tweet, the image of Jordan with the caption “And I took that personally” started to spread on the platform. The next day (May 18, 2020), Twitter user @Steph_I_Will posted a meme based around The Avengers utilizing the image.
A few days later, on May 21st, another version of the image was posted on Twitter by @tirhakalove featuring a joke about Lana Del Rey. The post got 18k retweets and 96k likes.
Soon, the meme template hit Reddit, finding quick use among many different communities. Since this was 2020, it’s only fitting that Covid and Tiger King come into play. Indeed, on October 3rd, JimmyD416 on Reddit posted a Trump getting Covid joke on /r/meme, before it was removed by moderators.
The post received 5200 points before being removed by moderators. On the other hand, on October 4th, a meme was posted to /r/TigerKing featuring the Jordan image. It gained 790 points on its first day.
Meme examples
