My least favorite moment in the history of pop music is in “Imagine,” when John Lennon says: “Imagine no religion, it’s easy if you try.”
Listen, dude. I know you’re a Beatle, but the world at large is totally capable of entertaining the thought of an irreligious world. That is so not a next-level concept. If you’re not toying with those crucial postulations by, like, 15 (right after the Linkin Park phase, right before the Ayn Rand phase) you’re toast. Life is way harder than that. “It’s easy if you try.” My god, John, you’re not the only critical thinker in this garbage world.
But Lennon’s faux profundity is prevalent in demographic besides that of aging, hapless hippies—namely, 14-year-old malcontents. Spurious human insight takes a very particular combination of self-importance and a disconnection from everyday responsibility enjoyed by the retired and too-young-to-pay taxes alike. Glory days, y’all.
With that in mind, let’s take a hard look at the r/im14andthisisdeep subreddit, a place where you can share wonderful wisdom on the unbearable wokeness of being directly from the junior philosophers who hatched it. These are their finest—which is to say worst—attempts at serious thought.
At 2102 upvotes, it’s time to do some soul-searching:
It might not be all their fault, man.
At 2771 upvotes, that’s not how that works:
https://imgur.com/H2K4DeI
This is flawed. I mean, what? No. That’s not what that means. You can’t attach the pregnant feeling of deadwood mortality to the hyphen. Sorry.
At 2783 upvotes, the wokeness makes the worst bumper sticker ever:
View post on imgur.comI remember when I turned 19 and became acutely aware that the ostensibly responsible men and women we were electing to govern were just as rattled by doubts and indecisions as the rest of us. It was terrifying, because up to a certain point, everyone has a fundamental faith in the political infrastructure that’s in place, and all of a sudden you’re grappling with the undeniable truth that Barack Obama probably has no idea what to do about climate change. In exactly that moment, this cartoon was probably pretty relevant. To everyone else, the pastiche is kind of… nostalgic?
At 3795 upvotes, Justin Bieber’s mixed metaphors.
View post on imgur.comMy man. You are personifying a Taco Bell taco as a devoutly faithful entity. You shouldn’t need me to tell you why that doesn’t play. You could’ve said, like, “You don’t have to go to church to be a Christian, you don’t have to enlist to support the troops.” That doesn’t even totally make sense, but it’s miles better than the taco thing you did.
That being said, I’d still like to make Justin Bieber pope.
At 4099 upvotes, the most obvious decision anyone has ever made:
View post on imgur.com
Yes, of course. It’s two months. TWO MONTHS! And it’s a nice-looking cabin, too! You’re really going to have to try harder with your quandaries, kid.
At 4740 upvotes, painfully entry-level wokeness:
View post on imgur.comSatire. The word you’re looking for is “satire.” It defines the sort of comedy that doubles as an impassioned social plea. Most people point to A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift as the greatest artifact of the genre. It was published in 1729.
We’re happy you’re thinking about this stuff, teens—honestly, we are. But if not everything needs to be said, then even less needs to be memed.
Photo via Fredrik Rubensson/Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0)
