Michael Jordan may be arguably the greatest Basketball player to ever live, but he has found himself as a meme in a lot of different scenarios. Recently, I wrote about how the ?Crying Jordan? meme went viral and why it will stay viral, but Jordan also has a different meme that gained popularity over the years, and it is a meme that doesn?t appear to be slowing down.
In 1987, McDonalds produced a PSA about drug and alcohol abuse which featured Jordan. McDonalds figured if they used the biggest athlete in the game for their message, they would get it across. While they did just that, they got something else years later as well?an endless meme. During one part of the PSA, Jordan said, ?Stop it, get some help,? in response to what people should do if they find themselves having an issue with drug and alcohol abuse. Years later, the internet turned this into a glorified meme in response to anything on the internet that viewers would find weird, random, etc. Viewers who used Vine know that this meme was heavily featured on the app with a lot of videos.
The saying, ?Stop it, get some help,? can be seen in videos of teenagers doing impressions, college students doing random things, and in videos were people are just trying to be funny. Below are some examples of the meme and how the internet has used them creatively.
There are a few things to keep in mind when it comes to this meme. The first thing is that whether you want to believe it or not, this meme has a top down effect and it comes from McDonalds. McDonalds created the PSA in 1987 and used Michael Jordan to help get the message about drug and alcohol use. While McDonalds never anticipated that their message would blow up into a comical meme, if the PSA was never created then the meme would not exist. So technically, McDonalds accidentally became the top down effect to this meme. Without them, the meme would not exist.
While there is a accidental top down effect, the bottom up effect created with this meme was no accident. The bottom up effect was created by the people on the internet who saw an opportunity with the meme. Looking at the videos above, these videos are not made by huge corporations like McDonalds, Apple, etc. They are made by everyday internet users who keep the meme going every single day. While the top down effect was an accident, the bottom up effect was not.
In conclusion, the crying Jordan meme was not the only meme that Michael Jordan has trending every single day. The ?Stop it get some help,? meme has the potential to live on for a very long time. Every time there is something new in the news that is ?meme worthy? this meme pops back up. As long as Michael Jordan is relevant, so will this meme.
