Having fun is dead. Being weird is dead. Whimsy is dead. Cringe killed it all.
If something is “cringey” it is usually seen as embarrassing or worthy of being mocked. “Cringe culture,” started on the internet, is a culture of making fun of or bullying other people’s interests by deeming them as cringey. It has been most popular in the late 2010s and has been around since early YouTube and Reddit. The oldest cringe compilation or “Try not cringe challenge” YouTube videos I could find are from 2015.
I believe this is a natural part of being online. As we are all becoming increasingly more public about our lives, it is inevitable that we find ourselves getting judged and judging other people.
I am no exception to this and can be extremely judgemental. The difference with cringe culture is people’s comfortability in expressing their judgment. I keep it to myself or tell a few close friends, but people online are ruthless.
The best way I saw it explained was, “Slowly, the internet is turning into a Disney Channel high school bullying episode, and we’re all victims of it.” These individuals mock others for liking things deemed “abnormal” or “socially unacceptable.”
Now that we are all afraid to be called cringe, we are more aware of what we say and do not only online but in public. This has caused us to become boring, watered-down, personality-less minions! And when we do see someone with a big personality, we feel immediate second-hand embarrassment at the idea of them having the audacity to take up space like that.
Keep to yourself, stay quiet, only talk about popular topics that everyone else seems to like. It is maddening. There are so many times I want to joke and laugh and make a conversation go past surface level but it just won’t work, and then I feel like a freak. I am not a freak! I am just tired of being bored.
We need to be more comfortable with being embarrassed. Embarrassment is not a bad thing, it is proof that we are being our true, vulnerable selves. Whenever I think about something embarrassing I’ve done, I’ll admit it, it makes me want to keel over right then and there, and never show my face again.
But the more I am removed from an embarrassing situation and the more embarrassment I feel, it turns into a feeling of pride. I am proud of myself for the times I have put myself out there. I want to get the most out of life and the only way to do this is by being vulnerable, inevitably with the possibility of being embarrassed.
Embarrassment can be defined as “a self-conscious emotion experienced in short-lived situations.” It can lead to feelings of awkwardness, humor, shame and even self-loathing. It is often judged in terms of societal standards and the person’s sense of self. No one wants to be perceived in a negative way, so we do our best to follow every and all social norms.
A sense of self-awareness is extremely vital. “Scientists believe that the ability to critically evaluate oneself as a separate entity gave early humans a survival advantage that has carried across evolutionary time until now, currently manifesting as the array of self-conscious emotions.” It makes sense, but it was never meant to be taken this far.
So no, it’s actually not cringey, it’s not embarrassing, it is fun and honest and vulnerable. What is the point if we are not those things?
Thank god the people closest to me get it. We are weird and have embraced that fully. We are not afraid to be embarrassing, we are not afraid to take up space!
“And if embarrassment is what it costs to live a full, earnest, and beautiful life, then so be it,” Bird said.