CULTURE

All the Best Coronavirus Memes to Keep You Laughing Through Quarantine

When your healthcare system is entirely broken, memes are the best medicine.

Photo by engin akyurt on Unsplash

The COVID-19 pandemic may be one of the lowest points in modern human history, but it's definitely a high point for memes.

As it turns out, the more time we spend holed up in quarantine, the more time we have to spread stupid images of people hoarding toilet paper. During trying times like these, memes are more than jokes. Looking at the lighter side of things is more important than ever when trying not to spiral into depression, and given the current state of the world, that makes memes a borderline medical necessity.

Anyways, there are some great coronavirus memes out there, so if you're going to get infected with a horrible, potentially deadly virus, you might as well get infected with some laughter, too.

Toilet Paper Memes

Despite the fact that COVID-19 is primarily an upper-respiratory virus, people have been hoarding toilet paper like they're expecting dysentery.

That's not to say it's not a good idea to have extra toilet paper to last through a quarantine, but there are definitely more important things to consider. Like...food.

Also, buying more toilet paper than you actually need is incredibly selfish. One family can only sh*t so much.

So enjoy being surrounded by toilet paper as the world falls apart around you. At least you won't have a dirty butt.

Handwashing Memes

Aside from quarantine and social distancing, washing your hands is one of the primary defenses against coronavirus. It's of the utmost importance to learn how to do it properly.

For those of us who do wash our hands properly, dry hands will likely become the bane of our existence.

Also, don't forget to sanitize surfaces. Wipe down your doorknobs, light switches, countertops, etc. to avoid the spread of germs.

Oh, and any face mask other than an N95 respirator mask—which are only needed by medical professionals right now and are in short supply—isn't particularly useful against coronavirus. So stop buying up masks. They won't help you.

Introvert Memes

To some extent, the whole social distancing/quarantine shtick is kind of old hat for introverts.

If anything, it's the ultimate excuse for those of us who already dislike social interactions.

That's not to say that the pandemic is a good thing, but hey, might as well seek out the positives.

Quarantine Memes

For most people, though, quarantine is a massive disruptor to daily life. It's important to establish routines wherever we can to establish a new sense of normalcy.

The internet can allow us to maintain work relations and social interactions to avoid total isolation.

Although the unfortunate reality is that major life events for many people will still be disrupted and potentially ruined.

It's hard to consistently stay positive during a period as stressful as this one, so remember to prioritize self-care.

Even if your plans are ruined, there are plenty of ways to still have fun from home. Like video games. Or...

People Taking Coronavirus Seriously Memes

Ultimately, as much as we joke, coronavirus is ridiculously serious.

It's of the utmost importance that we stay home and stop traveling unnecessarily.

The American healthcare system is absolutely broken, and we need to make sure that the most at-risk people in our community are able to access the life-saving medical attention they require.

So while we continue to laugh at all the coronavirus memes, let's keep in mind that human lives are on the line and it's each of our responsibilities to do our parts in preventing the spread.

2020 Memes

Oh, and let's also not forget that 2020 can, and probably will, get a whole lot worse.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

It's easy to hate Matt Colvin, the hand sanitizer guy.

In the midst of a crisis, sometimes all we want is a bad guy to lash out at so we can unload all of our pent up fear, upset, and aggression. We want this bad guy to be a real cartoon villain, the type of immoral monster who we can feel good about attacking. We also want this bad guy to have a really punchable face. Enter Matt Colvin, the hand sanitizer guy.

Profiled by The New York Timesright as the fear over America's Covid-19 pandemic started to kick into full-swing, Matt Colvin is a "FAMILY MAN" (according to his stupid shirt) who spent three days at the beginning of March driving a U-Haul truck across Tennessee and Kentucky to buy up all the hand sanitizer and anti-bacterial wipes he possibly could. Then, after clearing out every "little hole-in-the-wall dollar stores in the backwoods" that he and his equally trash brother, Noah Colvin, came across, Matt listed everything on his Amazon store for an insane mark-up—up to $70 per bottle.

Matt Colvin, whose brain might be diagnosed as "literally melting" if medical professionals had the bandwidth to deal with anything other than the coronavirus right now, rationalized that he was fixing "inefficiencies in the marketplace" by selling hand sanitizer to parts of the country where people needed it most. "I honestly feel like it's a public service...I'm being paid for my public service."

The larger article follows the response to Colvin's actions, namely by Amazon, which pulled his listings (and later banned his account), and the Tennessee attorney general's office, which sent him a cease-and-desist letter and opened a case investigating his violation of a state price-gouging law that prohibits charging "unreasonable prices for essential goods and services, including gasoline, in direct response to a disaster."

By the end of the article, Matt—who concluded that if he couldn't sell his ill-begotten hoard online, he'd need to unload them locally—had a nearly fourth wall-breaking revelation: "I'm not looking to be in a situation where I make the front page of the news for being that guy who hoarded 20,000 bottles of sanitizer that I'm selling for 20 times what they cost me."

Frankly, it's hard to fathom why, if that were the case, Matt Colvin would have ever agreed to this interview. Perhaps his hubris and self-delusion is indicative of the very plight of humanity, we arrogant primates certain of our superior position in the universe right up until we're wiped out by a microscopic virus that looks like an off-brand suction cup ball.

Sure enough, almost immediately after The New York Times' article went live, Matt Colvin went from being a nameless douchebag scalping items from a storage unit to "that guy who hoarded 20,000 bottles of sanitizer that [he sold] for 20 times what they cost [him]" and, more importantly, a social pariah.

In a follow-up interview the day after publication, Matt Colvin cried to The New York Times. After his name trended on Twitter, he became the subject of mass public outrage. He was promptly doxxed and inundated with death threats. Amazon and Ebay both suspended his accounts (which were apparently his livelihood, through which he made over $100,000 per year scalping various items). The storage facility he rented space from to store his items kicked him out. "It was never my intention to keep necessary medical supplies out of the hands of people who needed them," he said. "That's not who I am as a person. And all I've been told for the last 48 hours is how much of that person I am."

Now, under active investigation by the state of Tennessee, Matt Colvin is being forced to donate all of his remaining hand sanitizer.

On one hand, it's very hard to feel bad for Matt Colvin. No bones about it, the guy is a steaming, albeit presumably very sanitized, piece of human sh*t who has brought the hatred of a nation upon himself entirely through his own intentional, despicable actions. We're talking about a man who, drunk on a cocktail of stupidity and selfishness, potentially put countless needy lives at risk to profit off of a pandemic.

But at the same time, one has to wonder—Why is it so easy to hate Matt Colvin, but most people don't get nearly as angry about the CEOs who do similar things on a much wider scale?

Sure, it makes sense to hate Matt Colvin—a random, seemingly very stupid man in Tennessee being a selfish d*ck right now by trying to profit off of the coronavirus. But why don't we also hate Ian C Read, the former CEO and current chairman of American pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, under whom the company increased their prices on 100 medications in 2018, far outpacing US inflation. Undoubtedly, Ian C Read's price gouging targeting people in medical crisis has damaged far more lives than Matt Colvin. But is Ian C Read getting targeted with public outrage? This man has made at least 219 million dollars, at least in part by profiting off human suffering. Is anyone even looking his way?

Worse, Ian C Read is just one example. Look at any American pharmaceutical company that has hiked up necessary, life-saving medications to outlandish prices. Google their CEO. Why don't you despise them nearly as much as you despise Matt Colvin? Is it because they're wearing suits?

The point here isn't that Matt Colvin deserves sympathy. He's a horrid grifter whose selfishness outs himself as unfit for a functioning society. The point is that he's a symptom of a much larger problem, and that if we're going to go after him, we might as well go after all the wealthy, powerful CEOs who are much, much, much worse.

Ghen Cô Vy| NIOEH x K.HƯNG x MIN x ERIK | WASHING HAND SONG | CORONA SONG

While COVID-19 may be the harbinger of the apocalypse, at least for global stock markets, that doesn't mean it can't also be the inspiration for some super catchy tunes.

As it turns out, one of the primary preventative measures we can take in combatting the spread of coronavirus is washing our hands. Unfortunately, it just so happens that most of us have no idea how to actually wash our hands properly. In fact, according to a 2013 study, only 5% of people know how to wash their hands effectively—a process that involves scrubbing your hands for at least 20 seconds with soap before rinsing with water. But if people can't figure out how to perform an action as simple and basic as washing their hands, how can we possibly hope to prevent the spread of infectious diseases?

Enter Vietnam. Yes, the whole country. Well, kind of. Vietnam's National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health teamed up with lyricist Khắc Hung to release a coronavirus-oriented cover of the V-Pop song "Ghen" by singers Erik and Min. The resulting hybrid pop song, "Ghen Cô Vy," teaches you how to wash your hands the right way while also being really, really, ridiculously catchy.

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But the fun doesn't end with just just a catchy song, oh no. The true beauty of "Ghen Cô Vy" wasn't fully realized until dancer Quang Đăng released an accompanying dance. Only then could the song truly go...viral.

Generally speaking, people are much more likely to build essential habits if those habits are somehow gamified.

Whether it's getting a sticker on a chart every time you brush your teeth or gaining experience in an app every time you run a mile, gamification has the potential to make not fun things, well, kind of fun. That's where the real genius of Đăng's corresponding Instagram post comes into play. See, not only do Đăng's smooth dance moves mimic the actions of proper hand-washing, but he invites other people to join him in a dance challenge.

By laying out the necessary "dance" moves and encouraging others to share their own versions, Đăng effectively teaches people exactly how to do the basic thing they should be doing in the first place if they don't want to actively spread diseases. The full "game rules" are as follows, because, you know, they're kind of important:

"Game rules: You perform the dance of the song Ghen Co Vy with 6 hand washing movements as recommended by the World Health Organization and the Ministry of Health...Take this challenge or share the following epidemic prevention habits:

1. Wash your hands often with soap or an antiseptic solution.
2. Do not put hands on eyes, nose and mouth.
3. Regularly clean personal hygiene, hygiene of utensils, houses and surroundings.
4. Wear a mask to go to public places, on vehicles or when you are sick.
5. Self-awareness to improve health for themselves, the family and the community.
6. People with symptoms of COVID-19 have high fever, cough, shortness of breath, etc. or close contact with infected person / person suspected of COVID-19 and limit contact with other people and contact local health facilities."

Đăng's efforts have been a massive success, with the song quickly becoming a worldwide phenomenon, especially on TikTok where people have been actively spreading their own interpretations of the "coronavirus song." One can only hope that the song's popularity translates to an uptick in improvement of actual hand-washing techniques because, really guys, it's not that hard.

Currently in the US, president Donald Trump is doing everything in his power to deny the severity of the coronavirus crisis. That leaves it to us, as informed citizens, to prioritize the safety of ourselves and the people around us and to make sure we're doing everything in our power to avoid spreading a deadly disease to the immunocompromised people in our communities. So listen to "Ghen Co Vy," and take it to heart. Then make sure to wash your hands many times every day.