Tumblr Humor At Its Finest, Part Two

In a previous blog post, I talked about the warped sense of humor that Tumblr users have. In this post I continue my investigation of Tumblr humor and what exactly people who use this social network find funny.

One thing that must be considered is Tumblr’s main audience. According to Business Insider, Tumblr “is strong with teens and young adults interested in self-expression” with 46% of its audience between the ages of 16 and 24. The type of humor generated thus caters to people who are currently in or just left the awkward stage of adolescence and are merging into adulthood.

The post above brings to light a dark past that I myself have experienced. Our generation began to embrace social media around seventh and eighth grade, a time that nearly everyone remembers as awkward. I remember sending many texts that proclaimed how random I was, and I also used the “xD” emoticon much more than should have been allowed.

Tumblr’s demographic also collectively remembers the same cartoons, movies, and music from their younger days. A few posts became popular in part because everyone knows the characters from the cartoon which got its start in the 90’s, Spongebob Squarepants.

Both “stepping on the beach” and the-groundskeeper’s caption “what i did in graphic design class today is” refer to popular Spongebob episodes. The picture itself imitates an older meme which takes The Perks of Being a Wallflower’s quote, “And in that moment, I swear we were infinite” and applies it to ridiculous situations like this one.

This next post kind of terrifies me.

By itself, the picture is pretty funny. The character of Spongebob is oddly distorted and the accompanying text is nonsensical. But Tumblr, as usual, takes it further with these pieces of artwork by moopdrea and pentecost, respectively.

These rather terrifying additions turn a funny post into a hysterical one.

Tumblr users are also fans of defying expectations…

…being somewhat rude…

…and using puns wherever humanly possible.

Of course my favorite types of Tumblr humor are the completely odd and unexpected posts that just kind of jolt you.

The staff of Tumblr understands its demographic and the type of humor its users have. So every once in a while, they get in on the fun as well. The following pictures are all a part of one post.

 

Tumblr Humor At Its Finest, Part One

One of the main ways the users of Tumblr have affected my everyday life is by their warped sense of humor.

Sometimes, as I’m laughing hysterically at a Tumblr post, the people around me will ask, “What is it? I want to see!” With tears in my eyes I’ll turn my computer around to let them see the post. Often I’ll get a weak chuckle or a confused expression in response. I’ll try to explain the humorous aspect, but we all know trying to explain the joke makes it less funny. So thanks for putting me in so many awkward situations, Tumblr.

This post is the first of several dedicated to the many funny posts on Tumblr. Some of these everyone will laugh at. Some of them require background knowledge or knowledge of current events to get the joke. And some of them … I don’t even know, man.

Let’s start with something everyone can find funny, one of my favorite examples of Tumblr humor:

Here’s a great post that makes fun of the sentence structure. The commentators of this post choose to interpret the sentence as stating that the crayon will only burn for 30 minutes in an emergency situation. Naturally, one has to wonder what sort of emergency situations apply. I also personally love the aesthetic quality of a crayon on fire.

Now for some creative Tumblr humor. One of the most unique things about Tumblr is the way its users combine old and new media, a topic which will be explored in depth in a later post. This is one of my favorite examples, a combination of an older piece of literature with modern music.

I don’t even know what prompted the original poster to bring those two elements together. But in the Tumblr world, posts like this beg to be created. The second user actually took the time to sit down and puzzle out how Macklemore’s song “Thrift Shop” would be presented in the style of Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Raven,” and they did it brilliantly. Not only is it hilarious, but it shows the intelligence and creativity of some Tumblr users.

Here’s one that pokes fun at some of the glitches of the new iPhone 6. Apparently it has a habit of bending when someone tries to keep it in a back–or even a front–pocket. So Tumblr had a little fun with that.

Okay, now we’ll get into the weird stuff. This is where I start to think my sense of humor has been permanently twisted by this website.

So here’s something interesting. All of the users who contributed to that post don’t exist at those URLs anymore. Maybe because their mere connection to this post means they were harassed with hundreds of questions about why it even exists. But really. Someone had this idea, managed to scrounge up several GameCubes (or maybe they just had a pile in their basement, I don’t know) and placed them among flowers. If I saw just the picture I would probably wonder what sort of recreational drugs the original poster was on, but the caption really makes this funny. Now I’m picturing a bunch of GameCubes frolicking in a field.

Maybe it’s the pun. Maybe it’s the absurdity of a dog sitting in a news studio. Maybe it’s his blunt reply and the clear indication that this dog has been through puns like this before and will not tolerate this sort of unprofessionalism any longer. Whatever it is, this post gets me every time.

Finally, I think this post sums up Tumblr’s sense of humor quite nicely. Often no caption is required to get the humor across, and this Tumblr user evidently did not feel the need to include one. But everyone once in a while, some person scrolling through their dashboard will come across a post like this and begin to contemplate what exactly led them to this website, to the moment in their existence when they must be subjected to this sort of awful humor.

In this situation, I think the profanity is entirely justified.