Meet the Sarcasm Only Instagram Account
Sarcasm is a highly divisive style of speaking. For some of us, it’s become an uncontrollable impulse to reply sarcastically when anyone utters an obvious statement, but for others, it’s considered a rude and sharp way of communicating. We can understand both sides, but if you’re not a fan, please make way for the sarcasm fanatics! The Sarcasm Only Instagram account is the perfect place for those of us who just can’t help but reply with, “Yeah, right!” or “No waaay!” It’s a medical condition; we really can’t control it!
This popular page, which has shared over 21k posts and amassed a whopping 16.2 million followers, isn’t just about mocking others. It also posts hilarious self-deprecating jokes, sarcastic memes about life, and pics that all of us can relate to. So sit back, grab a snack, relax, and enjoy all of these memes that might make you feel bonded to your fellow sarcastic soul mates. Unless you’re looking at this while you’re working, then you should really take your time going through it. Otherwise, you’ll have to go back to work!
Why Do People Love Sarcasm and Sarcastic Memes So Much?
To get to the bottom of why many people love sarcasm memes so much, we reached out to Andrea M. Darcy, a coach and mental health expert, who was kind enough to have a chat with Bored Panda. First, Darcy explained that sarcasm on the internet and sarcasm in real life are two separate beasts. "Sarcasm on the internet is often just a kind of high end humor, a play on situations and words. It’s often very creative, and even a way to spread ideas that can be useful, and can highlight important political or societal issues we need to think about," she shared.
"And often people sharing sarcastic memes are not really the sarcastic type, they aren’t using that sort of humor in real life. We just see the immediate humor, mindlessly laugh and/or share, and move on," the expert added. "So where sarcasm is of more interest to me is when I come across someone who is consistently using it as a form of communication. Because that is what it really is, a warped way to communicate what is bothering us, or what we want, in a way that can unfortunately upset others."
Darcy went on to note that she actually doesn't think very many people use sarcasm in real life, as opposed to sharing hilarious sarcastic memes online. "There I find it’s quite a limited subset of people, as it’s really a humor that requires a certain type of thinking, a certain intelligence and creativity, and even a sort of arrogance, to make it really land," she explained. "I say arrogance as the hidden message behind sarcasm, whether we realize it or not, is, ‘look how much smarter I am than you’. Other forms of humor are more about, ‘look what we have in common’. So I see sarcasm as also a lonely form of humor. It places us above others looking down."
"As for whether sarcasm becomes a habit the more we use it, all humor does," Darcy continued. "Because it gets us attention. We see we made others laugh, and we get a little hit of connection. And that can feel addictive, particularly, as is often the case with sarcasm, if we are using humor because we are insecure or socially awkward otherwise. As humans we are driven to seek connection, it’s a primal drive, really. Not surprising as at one point connection upped our chances of survival. We needed the connection of a tribe to raise our likelihood of finding food and fighting off wild animals, etcetera."
"For me, sarcasm often says a person grew up in a home where they weren’t given enough love, support, and attention for who they were," the expert went on to explain. "Either they were criticized, or they were overlooked, or they were only given attention if they were interesting, funny, or good. When we aren’t fully accepted and supported as kids, we create masks that make us feel safe. Defense mechanisms. That we carry into adulthood. Sarcasm can be just that, a defense mechanism."
"Sarcasm tends to be the humor of choice of those who are insecure but also very smart," Darcy noted. "Perhaps even sidelined a bit by others as they were smart. You see it takes a certain intelligence to be a master of sarcasm. Sarcasm can give a smart, awkward type some social credibility."
"But it also says someone is defensive," she added. "Sarcasm is also a form of defensiveness. People using sarcasm a lot are often doing it as deep down they feel criticized, so they criticize back in a funny way. They deflect and project. So those who always use sarcasm can be hiding that they are actually quite sensitive."
Darcy explained that sarcasm and sarcastic memes can also hide anger and an inability to show anger in healthy ways. "[It] is the passive aggressive person’s humor of choice," she told Bored Panda. "Instead of being clear on what is bothering us and what we want, we couch it in sarcasm. We say, 'No, don’t worry, I just love having to wait half an hour every time we meet up, it fills my heart with joy to sit alone in a restaurant looking like a leper.' What we really want to say is, 'Hey, it makes me anxious when you are always late, it makes me kind of angry, can we find some sort of solution for this.'"
And according to the expert, sarcasm is not always appropriate, as it can be very hurtful. "The trouble is that we can be so addicted to sarcasm, and so reliant on it to communicate, that even when we know if we let it fly it will upset the other, we just can’t stop ourselves. And we say something that implies the other is stupid, or flawed, that gives the impression we know better than them, and they pull away from us. And we might feel bad about it, but out comes the sarcasm again, to cover up our vulnerability."
And while there are obviously healthier and less abrasive forms of communication, Darcy explains that it isn't always easy to break the habit if someone has been relying on sarcasm for ages. "I often find that when people hooked on sarcasm work on recognizing who they are without the sarcasm, at communicating without it, they often aren’t even people that invested in humor, oddly. All along it was just a defensiveness over a true desire to be funny."
"Sarcasm can also be a way to communicate frustrations we have with other people, or to point out how they continually don’t meet our needs," the expert added. "So the true alternative becomes learning how to communicate in a straightforward, non violent way what is upsetting us and what our needs and feelings are. Which, of course, takes far more courage than being sarcastic and is a learning curve that can take some time."
"The trouble is that sarcasm is a barbed humor. So it attracts people as it’s funny, but it also slightly pushes them away," Darcy went on to warn. "And in fact leaves others slightly scared, worried they’ll be the next target. It’s what I personally classify as ‘lonely humor’. As it gives the user little moments of seeming connection, but also keeps others at arm’s length."
"So when I work with clients who always resort to sarcasm, I am immediately fascinated to understand what the drive behind it is," the expert explained. "What is the need for the sarcasm ‘wall’? What would it feel like to drop that wall and all their defenses, and be open and vulnerable to others again? Now that you are no longer that kid who doesn’t quite fit in and has to be funny to be liked but an adult with personal power? What if you don’t really need sarcasm anymore, even, you just think you do?"
"What I often find is that many people who rely on sarcasm are deep down bored of it, even exhausted by it, but that they don’t know how to stop the endless quips, how to drop the defensiveness that sarcasm has become," Darcy says. "On a certain level, it’s unconsciously being used to keep them feeling safe in the world, and they need to recognize they are an adult with personal power who actually is safe already, without the sarcasm."
If you'd like to hear more words of wisdom from Andrea M. Darcy, be sure to visit her website right here!
Are There Any Benefits of Using Sarcasm?
According to Francesca Gino at Scientific American, there may be some surprising benefits to using sarcasm, aside from the fact that it can keep people who annoy you at bay. Many communication experts and marriage counselors caution individuals to steer clear of using sarcasm, as it can be perceived as rude or offensive at times, but according to research, these ironic remarks and sarcastic memes about life can also boost creativity. Gino and her team found that participants in a study who engaged in sarcastic conversation fared better on creativity tasks than those who engaged in sincere or neutral dialogues.
Why is it that sarcasm can help boost our creativity? Well, Gino explains that the brain has to work a little harder to understand or interpret a sarcastic meme or comment, so it can lead to clearer and even more creative thinking. We have to decode the contradiction between tone and the actual words said, so we can’t just take a sarcastic remark at face value. However, sarcasm also has the power to damage relationships, if used inappropriately, so it’s important to only utilize this tool with individuals who we have healthy relationships with. Gino’s research also found that sarcasm can lead to conflicts if it’s used by people we don’t trust, and even when used by someone we love, we should be careful not to be too critical or harsh.
As popular as sarcasm memes are around the globe, not everyone perceives it the same way. Brits, for example, are known for being extremely polite to strangers, yet incredibly sarcastic to friends and loved ones, as poking fun at one another is seen as a way to express affection. And even in the United States, not everyone can take a funny sarcastic meme the same way. According to a study that compared college students from upstate New York with students from Memphis, Tennessee, students up North were far more likely to use sarcasm with one another than those in the South. In fact, 56% of Northerners considered sarcasm to be funny, while only 35% of the Southerners thought the same.
Teens in particular tend to love using sarcasm and sarcastic memes about life, to tell their parents how cool they are or how much they appreciate having a curfew and restrictions on screen time. But according to the BBC, this sass, as annoying as it may be, can actually be perceived as a sign of intelligence. Little kids don’t understand sarcasm, as they have to grow and develop to realize that not everything should be taken literally. But if your teen is an avid user of sarcasm, you can be proud of the fact that they’re experimenting with language, humor and, of course, they’re smart enough to understand that humans don’t always mean what they say.
