Memes have been a thing for the longest time–from when Facebook was trending, to Vine, and now Tiktok. We have created a world where wherever you go, all you can hear is “SIX, SEVEENN!!!” and “MUSTAAARRRD!”
Everyday things have become so popular in the media that some of us would have no clue about. With this knowledge, some may be led to conclude that brains are rotting more than ever before.
The ‘brainrot mentality’ hit its peak in 2025 (or as they say, “in the big two-five”) coming off of the high of late 2024’s “prime brainrot” (ie: locked in alien, I like my cheese drippy bruh (credit Logan Paul & Lunchly), and Thick of It, by KSI.) This is what led to the first great meme of the big 25: the Low Taper Fade.
The Low Taper Fade was originally a meme from 2024 where Musician Eric Doa, on a freestyle live stream said to a tune “Imagine if Ninja got a Low Taper Fade” in a sing-song fashion. This clip shortly after went viral, with edits and such being created in accordance with the clip, the most massive of which being a highly edited picture of Ninja with a low taper fade. Towards the beginning of this year, the clip still had massive traction, leading many to state that the Low Taper Fade meme was “still MASSIVE!” This allowed the Low Taper Fade meme to become somewhat of a household name amongst the brainrot community.
The next to come along was what many consider the greatest collection of memes in 2025. The first of these “legendary” memes is known as “property in Egypt,” originating when British grindset influencer Cameron Eastwood made a video talking about how he bought a property in Egypt. This was later mashed up with the “Eye of Rah,” a meme where tiktoker Rahshad Bowen’s face is edited to have one eye and one bright crimson dread sticking up, creating a duo of sorts.
This collection reached its peak with the addition of what is arguably the second most influential meme of the big 25: Chopped Chin. Chopped Chin originated from a clip of Angel Wiley (son of former WNBA player Renee Montgomery) doing a “tuff” dance at a basketball game with his mother and nodding at the end. This dance went viral in January, and remained relevant going into February, sparking comments like “The way he nods is so friggin tuff boi ” as well as speculation surrounding the ‘background characters’ in the infamous Chopped Chin video.
As February came to a close, there was one final heavy hitter to fit into the month, the infamous “67” meme. This meme existed ever since January to limited success, with off-handed comments where people would say “six, seven” in reference to the song “Doot Doot (6 7)” by Skrilla. However, it was unique as the majority of people familiar with the “joke” all agreed it just wasn’t funny. This joke however remains in its renaissance to this day due to the act of a boy by the name Maverick Trevillian, also known as “The 67 Kid.” He gained the title “67 Kid” after a clip of him saying “AYYEEEEE!!!!! SIX SEVENNNNN!!!!!” at a basketball game went viral, pushing the meme to the mainstream and leading to its continued relevancy.
After February was the “Great Meme Depression of March 2025” A time where no new brainrot was being created. This silence was broken by the emergence of a new meme in April, the “MUSTARRDD” meme. This meme began as a response to Kendrick Lamar’s new album GNX, specifically the song “tv off” where Kendrick yells “MUSTARRRRRRDDD.” This led to people making a realistic copy of Kendrick Lamar’s face smiling and frowning using AI, which many consider to be horrifying. This was later mashed up with multiple clips from popular movies where a character said at some point mustard where in after, the photorealistic AI image of Kendrick smiling would appear and a slew of flashing lights would follow. These would, at times, begin with an epilepsy warning. These memes put the idea of brainrot into perspective.
By archiving these memes it can be concluded that brains are rotting. This obsessive style of humor was likely developed in order to keep up with the shrinking attention spans of the youth, due to young kids not having unlimited free time. With this in mind, it may result in them seeking as many short-term laughs as possible. It also led content creators and other people in the online space seeking to put out this type of content for others, jokes that are both simple and funny. While some of the jokes being popularized nowadays can have humor, they lack substance. With the emergence of memes like “67” and “mustard,” it can be seen that these memes are lacking the most crucial elements of a joke. They are purely a punchline with no set up, leading the jokes to feel stale in the eyes of some.
While this level of humor may be casually comedic, if this were to become the norm, highly thought out humor (ex. stand up) would become things of the past, leaving every joke to only be surface level. That is the reasoning behind all of these jokes being deemed as “brainrot.”
