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There have been a few things I've been thinking about lately, so I figured I'd sort of let loose my brain and see what I can come up with!

Cultural evolution and globalization are funny things, aren't they? Because of the massive influence that Western-based globalization has on the rest of the world (as the West practically runs the world), many previously "uncontaminated" cultures are evolving with ideas put forth by other countries and cultures. Multinational corporations, advertising, products, television, immigration, and probably a few other things I'm forgetting to mention exchanged between countries all of the world are slowly creating this one gigantic melting pot of multiculturalism, and previously separate cultures and fusing and combining into new cultures. Whether it be Gagnam Style from South Korea becoming a craze in the US, Italian cuisine being enjoyed in Australia, or McDonald's setting up shop in almost every country in the world, we're all affecting one another constantly and separate cultures are becoming increasingly intertwined. Before you know it, these intertwinings will be inseparable from one another. Messages and memes are spread throughout the world via the internet on a daily basis, and even the meaning of the word "meme" has seen evolution in recent years. I remember back in 2008 when I was just starting to become familiar with internet culture from lurking on 4chan, Encyclopedia Dramatica, and Know Your Meme (which catalogues memes). Back then, a meme, as far as the internet was concerned, was relatively unknown by general public or internet and served as familiar catchphrases, images, or identifiers of one's membership of certain cultural pockets of the internet. They started from something ridiculous posted on a message board, humours pictures that become popular, or even rather inconspicuous things that would otherwise not be notable enough to become a meme if its context wasn't notable. During the heyday of meme production on 4chan, so many memes were created on GET threads that someone said that if their post ended in some number which escapes me now, then Milhouse from The Simpsons would become a meme. This was seen as ludicrous by the community, and everyone started spouting off that "Milhouse is not a meme". This became so repeated that "Milhouse is not a meme" became a meme. I remember one particular post that went something like "'Milhouse' is not a meme. 'Milhouse is not a meme' is a meme". Back in those days, a meme was defined as an in-joke used by very particular communities on the internet that can also be used to identify one's group membership even when outside the usual website or message board. The phrase "I herd u liek Mudkipz", originally posted either in a Pokemon thread or Pokemon website, came to be the de facto phrase used by members of the group Anonymous to identify one another when outside of their usual websites like 4chan and Reddit. Nowadays, the whole concept of the image macro meme has become so widespread that even companies post random image macros with photos of animals and accompanying text on their Facebook pages. And they call them memes! In just a few short years, the definition and presentation of the meme has changed so drastically. It kind of ticks me off, to be honest. To me, a meme is still defined by it's pre-pop culture parameters and should only be used as an in-joke and identifying message. Which brings me to my next point.

The meme has sort of "globalized" in the past few years, and I can totally understand the whole tribalism counter to globalization, being a desire to return to traditional ways. In this case, the "traditional ways" are the  mid to late '00s, when the internet meme was much more conservative and personally meaningful. I can't even stand looking at memes today. So many meme websites have been cropping up lately, trying to cash in on the meme and humous image bandwagon. Websites that use the words "lol", "fun", "gag" and the like are everyone and it sort of sickens me. Rageface and Trollface used to be cool and genuinely funny. Now I just can't stand them. When I start thinking about this tribalism counter, it makes me wonder what the proper way for cultural evolution really is and whether a desire to return to traditional values even makes any sense. Human cultural evolution is characterized by the Ratchet Effect, in which people learn ideas from other people and use that baseline and build upon, thereby causing changes in the original idea. The idea evolves into something more sophisticated and refined. But if that is the essence of cultural evolution, then why do so many people desire to return to traditional ideas? That's not building on anything, it's just rehashing past ideas and moving backward in time, not forward. Maybe it's because people are intimidated by change and want to go back to what they're used to. But if that were how we truly are, why does culture evolve at all? Why wouldn't we just choose to stay at the same level forever? Even given this desire to stay with the familiar, our curiosity is what leads us to learn new things an create new ideas that allow our cultures and societies to evolve. It's almost contradictory in a sense. And obviously just staying at the same intellectual and cultural forever doesn't work. Just look at the Dark Ages in Europe. Yeah, that went over well.

Anyway, that's my rant for the night. I'll be back soon with some more brain droppings. Peace out, y'all!