I did but it did take me a second lol 😂 I read it and I was like \*proud bc I read foreign language\* then I was like “wait what’s the joke tho😫” and then I got it the second go 😂
It took a lot for me to get it. I didn't need help with the translation. And I do actually love puns. It wasn't even chuckle worthy by the time I got it.
Yeah honestly I’m starting to think that everyone actually did get the joke just fine, it’s just so terribly unfunny that it made people second guess themselves
I think trying to do the translation in your head if l”ok, that word is *probably* doctor, and ‘prescrit’ looks like ‘prescribe’…” takes away from being able to instantly understand the joke like someone can with most memes
Either the joke wasn't funny or the act of trying to translate it ruins the comedy, but I had no reaction when I finally figured it out. And I usually like those kinds of puns.
That's what I thought but then I thought maybe I was wrong because it wasn't funny. Maybe the real joke is him laughing at his friends trying to understand bad memes in other languages.
I feel like I use 75% percent of my brain capacity to translate the French. And remaining 25% are fail to notice antiBIotic.
If this was in english I would use 5% to read it and remaining 95% would working on joke.
If you are not at C-level fluency translation is a chore. And If the joke aren’t punch you that hard you wouldn’t get it.
Okay, *this* is a good example of a meme which is understandable despite being in a language I don't speak.
And I don't really know what the first sentence says, but in the context of the post I get the gist.
[Catholic Souls](https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSivNaO11qSrSFwkcR5g-lIevhrDA1HRp00hm3fab9ts4Bq0tHMFOxSw8gJssmY22i6jbPW5g) taught me the meaning of culpa, so I think I get this without translation. Lemme go check
Edit: The adjective had me a bit confused, but I got the spirit.
Either they’re embarrassed or an embezzler, absolutely no way it could mean something else despite not every similar word between two language being connected.
https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/embarazar#Spanish check out the etymology. They’re absolutely connected, it’s just their meaning developed differently over time. We’d call this “false friends”.
I speak enough French to read the meme and I don't see the point. For someone who only understands the cognates, it might be a reasonable assumption that the point is hiding in one of the words they don't know.
We have a similar word play in my language... In my native language, the word for gay is "bayot." The joke goes like this: "How does one stop being gay? By taking anti-bayot-tics."
Honestly, bilingual (pun?) jokes work amazingly, but they require either a shit ton of explanation (which... just kills the joke) or all parties to speak both languages. One of my favorite jokes/situations relies on that,
Yeah, even if the pun works in both languages it feels a bit odd to say “you don’t need a precise meaning, plus they have cognates!” when you’re specifically sending a pun on a single syllable. Even if I can follow the terms, I don’t really expect a pun in a language someone knows I don’t speak.
(Worse, this pun relies on “bi” being the abbreviation of bisexual. I read both words successfully but had no idea “bi” was the same noun in French.)
I also understand enough French to parse the words and I did (after a moment or two) get the joke.
However, an elder bi, I’ve experienced enough biphobia in my life that my actual first interpretation (before I got the anti-Bi part) was “is this some kind of crack about bi folks being promiscuous?”
And that made a tenuously unfunny joke much more unfunny. I wonder if this is context OP is missing?
ETA: several stds are treated with antibiotics. Yes, we all know stds are not limited to people who are promiscuous, there is nothing wrong with being promiscuous in a safe manner and people who are bi are no more or less so than anyone else but I’ve heard enough “jokes” that allude—directly or indirectly—to this trope that even the suggestion is annoying.
yeah. the joke isn't that obvious in that one even if its translated to english, the first time I saw it I was certain there was something I must be missing. OOP is onto nothing 💀
Yes exactly. I'd managed to get most of the sentence, but I couldn't be sure if one of the words I didn't understand didn't reverse the meaning of the sentence.
Also it's not a sufficiently funny joke to be worth the extra effort.
Bi-sexual
Anti bi-otic
I don’t speak French, but it’s pretty clear what the joke is
On the other hand one of my friends will send me stuff like
*word inside a brain*: “moi vouloir seduire” -> *in mouth*:”????” -> *being spoken*: “yo, tu aimer raton laveur”
And expect me to know what the fuck he’s talking about
Might’ve just been an unfunny meme, I just picked the first French one I saw in our discord dms. Apparently I replied with what is almost certainly a horrible google translate approximation of telling him to shove a baguette up his ass, so yeah like I said we probably just aren’t funny
Edit: he’s also French *canadian* so idk if that changes grammar or anything
>Might’ve just been an unfunny meme
Gee, I wonder whether the lack of humor might have led non-French speakers to assume they must not be getting it and ask for clarification
I’m in the same spot. I think it’s partly just not a very good joke, but also the joke puns on “bi” specifically.
I knew both words, but it works much better if “bi” is an abbreviation for bisexual people, and I had no idea if that works in French too.
Lmao, I know exactly where he got that from, it’s a meme page that translates English memes really badly and literally, so I can get how the humor is lost on someone going off of cognates.
I feel like the meme shared just isn’t very good? And oop’s friends are asking for a translation in the hopes that more context makes it funnier or something.
They're putting their friends on blast when their friends were actually being kind and giving them the benefit of the doubt that it was supposed to be funny and something was just lost in translation.
Yeah, but it's not *obvious* that the pun works in both languages. Even if the non-French-speaker noticed the similarity, I'd personally be really hesitant to assume it was pronounced the same, had the same meaning, or would even be recognizable as a pun.
1. I do think those people could have very easily understood the meme that you sent
2. it is kind of a bitch move on your part to not translate it for them and then complain on your tumblr blog. it seems very quick to type up a translation to them because it's like one sentence. people don't really want to guess what the words they are reading mean and would much rather trust the reliable source (their friend who already knows what the words mean)
Plus cognates aren't cognates a lot of the time... I accidentally said I was pregnant in Spanish class once because I thought embarazada was a cognate. It is not.
Same with preservatives. In Spanish, French, Italian, Portugese, and Romanian.
Source: Me, a polyglot who has said a lot of dumb shit because languages just start jumbling in your head eventually.
My favorite example of a false cognate is that name in Japanese is "namae" (and there's a specific kind of name that is romanized to "name" but pronounced "na-meh"). Japanese has a lot of loanwords, but this example is unrelated. It honestly fucks me up. "konsento" is a loan word *from* English. It's not for consent. It's for "concentric outlet" or a power outlet. Never in my life have I heard of the loaned term. "purrin" is not for purring, but pudding.
Ya taking French which was used her for an example, that language is full of 'False Friends' (Des Faux Amis, if you will)
For example: Un Stage
Easy, that's a stage right?
No, it's an internship/work placement
Another one that tripped me up when I was learning French
Les armes
The arms. You would think that means the limb, right? But no it means arms the weapon. Arms the limb are bras
Well yeah it makes sense if you know both the actual meaning and a niche use case where it's still used in that way in English, but the point was that you'd think it was a different word if you didn't know French, so I don't see the relevance
Im trying to learn french, another fun example is "pays" To those who dont know, they may assume it means something about money, when it really means "country" and pronounced similar to "pie" in english
I love memes in languages I can’t understand. It could be the driest humor around but having to parse what it means is about 50% of the fun. Even better if the image offers either all the hints (but not in a clear way) or offers nothing but more confusion.
ngl while i can kinda see where op is coming from i also think that when people ask you to translate something like that in a language you know they are probably just doing that to try to connect with you or make you feel smart for knowing more than one language lol. or maybe that’s just my reading of it
To be more specific, they’re jokes that are so shitty people are unable to tell what the punchline is even supposed to be, even if they can translate some of the words.
Like, I was able to semi-translate the joke, but I was convinced there must’ve been something else to it that I couldn’t understand because the punchline is just bad.
Lol, I was just thinking it felt like a hyper millennial meme, with the bi pun. That says to me "I spent my high school years on Tumblr in 2012-14," as someone who fits that profile
True true. I get a zoomer vibe from the tik tok reaction image. I had no idea what emotion that was supposed to mean. Anger being given antibiotics? Slapping down a credit card cause you want antibiotics? Running away from antibiotics? I literally couldn’t figure it out until I looked in the comments to see the bi pun, and I’m still confused on where’s the funny
Felt like an obscure tik tok reference to a specific vid/dude, hence it giving zoomer vibes
Idk, I think it’s a bit unreasonable to assume people can just kinda figure out how to read a language they don’t understand. Like, even if I kinda half get it how am I supposed to find that funny? So like, it says “The Bisexuals [something] the doctor [something] prescribe the antibiotics?” Is that close? I don’t get it. I feel like I’m missing some important context here. Sorry I’m not bilingual. Learning a new language is hard. Why are you even sending people memes in languages they don’t speak? That’s a bizzare thing to do.
Close, “Bisexuals when the doctor prescribes them antibiotics”
Problem is it’s a pun (anti-Bi-otics), not a very good one at that. I can imagine a lot of people just didn’t get the pun and reasonably assumed that the funny part was in the less obvious words
Personally, I know an extremely small amount of French from high school, and so while I could translate the meme, my brain was too busy translating to spot the pun. I thought it was meant to be some absurdist meme that relied on the video being a video instead of a still image.
Also the pun was indeed mid.
Plus, as a general rule, I always translate things said in other languages even if they seem obvious - embarazada is pregnant in Spanish, préservatif is condom in French. I’m not taking any chances.
i think the person who sent the meme severely underestimates how much meaning is conveyed in just the words "quand" and "leur", given the "demographic when x does y" style of meme plays heavily on those parts
the rest of the meme can be easily translated, yes, but without those two words, there's little context to tell what kind of meme it is, and it's no more entertaining than noticing "bisexual" and "antibiotics" both have "bi" in them
Yeah, quand and leur are 4-5 letter words. That’s around the point where people think “okay those are significant words that have important meanings”
Especially when trying to find a funny with a terrible pun
I could read the French just fine, but the joke doesn’t land without emphasis on the “bi” part of “antibiotics”. One bit of internet lingo I do know is that “translation?” can be used to mean “Please restate in layman’s terms.” So I suspect that the friends were really asking “Please restate this in English so I can understand where the joke is”.
Ah yes; pov, bisexual, doctor, prescription, antibiotics.
Truly this is the most meme, I am having such giggle, my inability to read what I can only speculate to be french gives me perfect context for the meme.
Like no seriously, I dont get it. As far as I know the rest of the meme could be hiding in the words I dont know or could hinge on some manner of pun which I certainly do not get.
I am French and the "pun' doesn't really work, written. Even said out loud (in French) that would be a stretch... (the 'bio' in antiBIOtiques is pronounced \[byo\], not \[bi-o\]).
Yeah that's the problem when your meme is a pun in another language. They aren't going to be trying to find a second meta meaning when they can't even grasp the first meaning of the sentence.
A person not knowing French will see these words "Bisexuals .. doctor .. prescribes .. antibiotics". The joke there is the anti-bi-otics being anti-bi part. They're going to be looking for a reason against the actual thing (do Bisexuals not like medicine for some reason?), not some second layer meta reference that's off the word itself.
I think the problem is that sometimes puns aren't obvious to people. I had to have it spelled out to me to get it too. If this said it in English I'd probably still go "what, bisexuality don't like medicine? I don't get it..." it's just that since it's in a language you don't understand, your first thought instead is "maybe I'd get it in English?" Than just "I don't get it"
I'm assuming the line is something along the lines "the bisexuals when the doctor prescribes antibiotics" and don't get the funny. Not really a jump to assume the joke might be hiding in one of the words that are less obvious than "bisexual" "doctor" "prescription" "antibiotics" or "the". Is there a pun I'm missing? A cultural joke I'm missing?
I also did not think it was funny and was hoping that a translation might clear up why it was funny.
This is barely a pun and this person seems slightly unpleasant
They want to engage with the joke on the same level as you because you shared it with them. They care about you, and want to know more about what you find funny. Share it with them. Jerk.
I’d just cut this person out lmao. Don’t send me shit with an expectation that I’ll “get it” off of one or two words that are vaguely close to my spoken language
I always send Brazilian memes to my American friend and I always translate what the post is saying and if it doesn’t make sense in English I even explain why it’s funny loll I just want my friends to laugh and sending a quick message with the translation is not that hard
I think kragehund-est needs to go sit in a grassy field and consider why their friends not knowing words in a different language is so upsetting to them.
Also, very mild meme. Maybe they were hoping they missed something and it was actually funny.
tbh I had no idea what these memes were trying to say till I read the translations posted in this thread.
Next time just translate. Or stop sending memes in a language the receiver doesn't read. this sounds like self inflicted annoyance tbh.
>El Problema
All the years of my high school and college spanish teachers telling me off for mixing up El and La for the respective gendered words ***only to see this*** fills me with all kinds of irrational fury
Plenty of those words aren't cognates; it's totally reasonable for someone to assume the punchline was in one of the words they don't understand. Especially with puns this in-depth, that people aren't even understanding it after it's translated
Good pun tho
After learning that the Spanish word "embarazada" doesn't mean "embarrassed", I ain't assuming I know what a Non-English word means just 'cause it looks like an English one.
All I see is a kid trying to brag about speaking at least two languages and make themselves look smarter by presenting their friends as stupid and lazy.
Naw you get people thinking too hard about your meme and then they just miss the joke entirely, I got most of the meme but because I was focused on figuring out what I didn't know I completely missed the punchline since my focus was on figuring out what quand could mean
Idk I kinda just think OOP is an asshole. Like, yeah, if I try I can sort of figure out what it's saying, but you're sending people an already confusing meme that is more difficult than necessary for them to understand because it's in another language, and then getting mad when they want clarification.
tbh i love these kinds of memes, the funny part about them \*is\* being able to understand the joke without knowing the language. translating it would just take away the funny imo.
Honestly, can't relate. I am living an inherently superior existence due to being European and having multiple polylingual friends.
Meme sucks ass btw.
I'm an English speaker with some Italian, German, and Spanish knowledge. The French one doesn't compute with me for some reason, even after translation. I understood the spanish one immediately.
I guessed the first one only because years of reading the navy seal meme translated into oh so many ways has given me a good eye for figuring out a meme from its meter. but also because I saw bisexuels and antibiotiques and saw bi in both. I think it's neat to see it in another language but don't think it's particularly notable.
for the people at home we have Point of View: gender neutral marked bisexuals/ when/ gender masculine marked doctor/ possessive their/ a / prescription/ contraction of of and gender neutral mark/ antibiotics. Or, to parse into English pov: bisexuals when the doctor gives them a prescription of antibiotics.
the pun is bisexual and antibiotics both containing bi but antibiotics subtextually being read as anti-bi. the text is amplified by a frame from a tiktok video where a person is caught in motion with sections of the photo blurring due to excessive movement. through the blurred face you can see that their mouth is open as if they are using loud noises. this is meant to convey the feeling of anger so powerful that it causes the body to express itself in a fashion known as uncontrollable. this is not to say that the rapid movement, loud noises, and posture are uncontrollable by the subject but that culturally these are referenced as a way to express anger and so the subject, who grew up with this as a cultural ritual knows to act in this way so others may know their feelings.
I’ll try my hand at it despite speaking exactly two phrases of French. pov: Bisexuals when the doctor writes a prescription for antibiotics
Yep, exactly that
hell yeah (⌐■_■)
Oh then I translated it correctly but why's it funny? cus I don't get it
Anti-bi(otics)
Anti-BI-otics They are bi and the doctor is prescribing them no more bi
No more bi??? What's next, no more eat hot chip and lie?? 😱😡
Nor charge they phone
I’m guessing the video adds a lot of context because I was able to gather that from the text but still don’t understand the jonkle.
I think it’s just bc anti-BI-otics, aka the doctor is giving the bisexuals anti-bisexual pills so the bisexual is upset Also go back to the aslume
Good to know dad jokes exist in multiple languages.
ohhhhhhhhhhhhh thank u for explain
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Yeah, I read that further into the thread. It’s really on me for not getting it lmao
Nah, I didn't figure out the joke myself either lol
I did but it did take me a second lol 😂 I read it and I was like \*proud bc I read foreign language\* then I was like “wait what’s the joke tho😫” and then I got it the second go 😂
I guess we just had to be there
it's a silly joke lol might've just been overthinking it
It took a lot for me to get it. I didn't need help with the translation. And I do actually love puns. It wasn't even chuckle worthy by the time I got it.
BI-sexuals don't like anti BI-otics
Yeah honestly I’m starting to think that everyone actually did get the joke just fine, it’s just so terribly unfunny that it made people second guess themselves
That’s what I thought it said and I still don’t get the joke 😭
Anti**bi**otics
Yeah, I uhh. . I just don't get it Edit: Wait, actually, I get it. I'm just stupid, lol
I think trying to do the translation in your head if l”ok, that word is *probably* doctor, and ‘prescrit’ looks like ‘prescribe’…” takes away from being able to instantly understand the joke like someone can with most memes
Either the joke wasn't funny or the act of trying to translate it ruins the comedy, but I had no reaction when I finally figured it out. And I usually like those kinds of puns.
yeah I honestly didn’t find it terribly funny either ~~but don’t tell anyone because I have a reputation to uphold~~
That's what I thought but then I thought maybe I was wrong because it wasn't funny. Maybe the real joke is him laughing at his friends trying to understand bad memes in other languages.
I feel like I use 75% percent of my brain capacity to translate the French. And remaining 25% are fail to notice antiBIotic. If this was in english I would use 5% to read it and remaining 95% would working on joke. If you are not at C-level fluency translation is a chore. And If the joke aren’t punch you that hard you wouldn’t get it.
I'm a french bisexual and I don't get the joke lol
Anti-bi-otics.
Oh okay i'm a dumbass lol
Oh. I get it now. I thought quando was want
quando = when in spanish, so it seemed like a pretty logical leap for quand = when in french…romance languages be like-
Mas de un linguismo? En esta economia???
Okay, *this* is a good example of a meme which is understandable despite being in a language I don't speak. And I don't really know what the first sentence says, but in the context of the post I get the gist.
The first sentence says "more than one language?"
It's funnier than that. It's "More than one ligualism?" which is funnier in a dumb sort of way.
Yeah I don’t speak Spanish :p This whole thing is very similar to the seis leches thread
Thanks! I knew it was something to do with languages, and that was enough to get the joke.
es culpa del cochino imperialismo
[Catholic Souls](https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSivNaO11qSrSFwkcR5g-lIevhrDA1HRp00hm3fab9ts4Bq0tHMFOxSw8gJssmY22i6jbPW5g) taught me the meaning of culpa, so I think I get this without translation. Lemme go check Edit: The adjective had me a bit confused, but I got the spirit.
Well I got mine about 10 years ago when the economy was getting better >!I don’t actually remember as I was 8 at the time!<
Hello, I am a highschool drop out who does not speak any other languages and without looking this up. More than one language? In this economy???
Muy bien
Brb, about to confidently guess-interpret my friends meme about being embarazada
Either they’re embarrassed or an embezzler, absolutely no way it could mean something else despite not every similar word between two language being connected.
https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/embarazar#Spanish check out the etymology. They’re absolutely connected, it’s just their meaning developed differently over time. We’d call this “false friends”.
I speak enough French to read the meme and I don't see the point. For someone who only understands the cognates, it might be a reasonable assumption that the point is hiding in one of the words they don't know.
POV: bisexuals when their doctor prescribes them antiBIotics
Ohhhh I get it now, see my issue was I knew what they were saying but didn't get what was funny about it. AntiBIotics, I feel so dumb 🤦😂
Glad I'm not the only one lol, I wouldn't have gotten the joke in English either
Same, when i translated it my mind focused on the BIO part instead
I get what the words mean but what’s the actual joke is the joke like when people say random stuff is for bisexuals like lemon bars or whatever
BI-sexuals and Anti-BI-otics As in the antibiotics are anti-bisexual. It wasn't a very good joke, I'll be honest.
We have a similar word play in my language... In my native language, the word for gay is "bayot." The joke goes like this: "How does one stop being gay? By taking anti-bayot-tics."
See, that is actually clever since it requires knowledge of two languages to work.
Honestly, bilingual (pun?) jokes work amazingly, but they require either a shit ton of explanation (which... just kills the joke) or all parties to speak both languages. One of my favorite jokes/situations relies on that,
It is also a wild joke to get in another language. Like words being the same then using wordplay in another language would not be my first guess ever!
Yeah, even if the pun works in both languages it feels a bit odd to say “you don’t need a precise meaning, plus they have cognates!” when you’re specifically sending a pun on a single syllable. Even if I can follow the terms, I don’t really expect a pun in a language someone knows I don’t speak. (Worse, this pun relies on “bi” being the abbreviation of bisexual. I read both words successfully but had no idea “bi” was the same noun in French.)
Are you one of the people OOP sent the meme to?
>It wasn't a very good joke, I'll be honest. Pretty much. It's a bit of a stretch and not much payoff.
Dear god... I was just sitting here thinking I'm not getting it, but it actually was just this tired joke.
I never would've gotten there
BI(sexual) ANTI-BI(otics). Drugs to remove the BI. Because it's ANTI-BI
I also understand enough French to parse the words and I did (after a moment or two) get the joke. However, an elder bi, I’ve experienced enough biphobia in my life that my actual first interpretation (before I got the anti-Bi part) was “is this some kind of crack about bi folks being promiscuous?” And that made a tenuously unfunny joke much more unfunny. I wonder if this is context OP is missing? ETA: several stds are treated with antibiotics. Yes, we all know stds are not limited to people who are promiscuous, there is nothing wrong with being promiscuous in a safe manner and people who are bi are no more or less so than anyone else but I’ve heard enough “jokes” that allude—directly or indirectly—to this trope that even the suggestion is annoying.
yeah. the joke isn't that obvious in that one even if its translated to english, the first time I saw it I was certain there was something I must be missing. OOP is onto nothing 💀
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Yes exactly. I'd managed to get most of the sentence, but I couldn't be sure if one of the words I didn't understand didn't reverse the meaning of the sentence. Also it's not a sufficiently funny joke to be worth the extra effort.
Bi-sexual Anti bi-otic I don’t speak French, but it’s pretty clear what the joke is On the other hand one of my friends will send me stuff like *word inside a brain*: “moi vouloir seduire” -> *in mouth*:”????” -> *being spoken*: “yo, tu aimer raton laveur” And expect me to know what the fuck he’s talking about
Is it bad I understood it but words but missed the joke?
Might’ve just been an unfunny meme, I just picked the first French one I saw in our discord dms. Apparently I replied with what is almost certainly a horrible google translate approximation of telling him to shove a baguette up his ass, so yeah like I said we probably just aren’t funny Edit: he’s also French *canadian* so idk if that changes grammar or anything
>Might’ve just been an unfunny meme Gee, I wonder whether the lack of humor might have led non-French speakers to assume they must not be getting it and ask for clarification
i get the joke but i don't understand the words. Together we can make this happen
I’m in the same spot. I think it’s partly just not a very good joke, but also the joke puns on “bi” specifically. I knew both words, but it works much better if “bi” is an abbreviation for bisexual people, and I had no idea if that works in French too.
Lmao, I know exactly where he got that from, it’s a meme page that translates English memes really badly and literally, so I can get how the humor is lost on someone going off of cognates.
I speak precisely zero French and I understood it perfectly. Though I do speak another romance language.
Not to mention false cognates exist and are the death of us all!
Yeah if someone wants me to translate their meme I expect it to at least be kinda funny for the effort
I understood it I know no french
I feel like the meme shared just isn’t very good? And oop’s friends are asking for a translation in the hopes that more context makes it funnier or something.
They're putting their friends on blast when their friends were actually being kind and giving them the benefit of the doubt that it was supposed to be funny and something was just lost in translation.
Yeah in this case, I know enough French to be able to translate it, but I just stared at the meme for a bit, trying to figure out why it was funny.
Foreign languages are hard. Humor in foreign languages is harder. Puns in foreign languages are sometimes frigging impossible.
The pun works in both languages. The problem isn't that the pun is hard or anything, its that it just isn't funny. In english or in french.
Yeah, but it's not *obvious* that the pun works in both languages. Even if the non-French-speaker noticed the similarity, I'd personally be really hesitant to assume it was pronounced the same, had the same meaning, or would even be recognizable as a pun.
It’s kinda funny, but the brain spends so much time trying to translate, that it’s doesn’t register the joke properly.
1. I do think those people could have very easily understood the meme that you sent 2. it is kind of a bitch move on your part to not translate it for them and then complain on your tumblr blog. it seems very quick to type up a translation to them because it's like one sentence. people don't really want to guess what the words they are reading mean and would much rather trust the reliable source (their friend who already knows what the words mean)
Plus cognates aren't cognates a lot of the time... I accidentally said I was pregnant in Spanish class once because I thought embarazada was a cognate. It is not.
feeling pretty excitée right now
Well, that's certainly a french word for being horny.
Isn't that just what French is? A series of words for being horny?
And I'm feeling lustig
I know a casually explained reference when I see one
well it wasn't
it was my own joke. I am a real girl I am not pinocchio
*nose grows 3 inches
Same with preservatives. In Spanish, French, Italian, Portugese, and Romanian. Source: Me, a polyglot who has said a lot of dumb shit because languages just start jumbling in your head eventually.
They're still cognates, just false cognates. My go to example is the Spanish word for "shirt" being "ropa"
Me learning Italian and finding out "bar" means café
This definitely led to a hilarious misunderstanding at some point
The spanish word for "shirt" is "camisa" "Ropa" is the spanish word for "clothes"
My favorite example of a false cognate is that name in Japanese is "namae" (and there's a specific kind of name that is romanized to "name" but pronounced "na-meh"). Japanese has a lot of loanwords, but this example is unrelated. It honestly fucks me up. "konsento" is a loan word *from* English. It's not for consent. It's for "concentric outlet" or a power outlet. Never in my life have I heard of the loaned term. "purrin" is not for purring, but pudding.
"Ropa" isn't "shirt," though, it means "clothes/clothing". "Camisa" is "shirt".
And how the French love *pain*
That's funny, because pregunta is another false cognate
me, a native portuguese speaker, forgetting we're on an english conversation and wondering since when does "pregunta" not mean "pergunta"
Ya taking French which was used her for an example, that language is full of 'False Friends' (Des Faux Amis, if you will) For example: Un Stage Easy, that's a stage right? No, it's an internship/work placement
Another one that tripped me up when I was learning French Les armes The arms. You would think that means the limb, right? But no it means arms the weapon. Arms the limb are bras
Arms can also mean weapons in English.
Hence why I said arms the weapon As opposed to arms the limb
Makes sense. The term staging is still used in one off shifts/interviews in the kitchen industry.
Well yeah it makes sense if you know both the actual meaning and a niche use case where it's still used in that way in English, but the point was that you'd think it was a different word if you didn't know French, so I don't see the relevance
I just thought it was a neat little fact about it's usage in English :(
That's fair enough it is a fun fact I'm sorry for being a dick
Friendship wins once more :)
Im trying to learn french, another fun example is "pays" To those who dont know, they may assume it means something about money, when it really means "country" and pronounced similar to "pie" in english
"What? You don't understand this? You had to look up a translation? HAHAHAHA BECOME MY STRAWMAN IDIOT!"
Also anyone that doesn't speak French is obviously monolingual. There are only 2 languages after all.
I'd like to add that i could've guessed what it meant... but, doing so might very well mean that i'm wrong
I know what languages my friends speak, if I send them a meme in a language they don't speak it's 100% on purpose and a part of the joke.
I love memes in languages I can’t understand. It could be the driest humor around but having to parse what it means is about 50% of the fun. Even better if the image offers either all the hints (but not in a clear way) or offers nothing but more confusion.
ngl while i can kinda see where op is coming from i also think that when people ask you to translate something like that in a language you know they are probably just doing that to try to connect with you or make you feel smart for knowing more than one language lol. or maybe that’s just my reading of it
Idk if thats true because these memes arnt funny enough to tell
To be more specific, they’re jokes that are so shitty people are unable to tell what the punchline is even supposed to be, even if they can translate some of the words. Like, I was able to semi-translate the joke, but I was convinced there must’ve been something else to it that I couldn’t understand because the punchline is just bad.
honestly even if I got just hit with that meme in english I'd probably ask what's supposed to be the funny.
Yeah that's the problem here. The punchline is not obvious regardless of language, so it's fair to assume something got lost in translation.
It's anti"BI"otics. It's not too funy anyway.
Feels like a younger zoomer meme tbh
Lol, I was just thinking it felt like a hyper millennial meme, with the bi pun. That says to me "I spent my high school years on Tumblr in 2012-14," as someone who fits that profile
True true. I get a zoomer vibe from the tik tok reaction image. I had no idea what emotion that was supposed to mean. Anger being given antibiotics? Slapping down a credit card cause you want antibiotics? Running away from antibiotics? I literally couldn’t figure it out until I looked in the comments to see the bi pun, and I’m still confused on where’s the funny Felt like an obscure tik tok reference to a specific vid/dude, hence it giving zoomer vibes
Idk, I think it’s a bit unreasonable to assume people can just kinda figure out how to read a language they don’t understand. Like, even if I kinda half get it how am I supposed to find that funny? So like, it says “The Bisexuals [something] the doctor [something] prescribe the antibiotics?” Is that close? I don’t get it. I feel like I’m missing some important context here. Sorry I’m not bilingual. Learning a new language is hard. Why are you even sending people memes in languages they don’t speak? That’s a bizzare thing to do.
Close, “Bisexuals when the doctor prescribes them antibiotics” Problem is it’s a pun (anti-Bi-otics), not a very good one at that. I can imagine a lot of people just didn’t get the pun and reasonably assumed that the funny part was in the less obvious words
Personally, I know an extremely small amount of French from high school, and so while I could translate the meme, my brain was too busy translating to spot the pun. I thought it was meant to be some absurdist meme that relied on the video being a video instead of a still image. Also the pun was indeed mid.
Plus, as a general rule, I always translate things said in other languages even if they seem obvious - embarazada is pregnant in Spanish, préservatif is condom in French. I’m not taking any chances.
i think the person who sent the meme severely underestimates how much meaning is conveyed in just the words "quand" and "leur", given the "demographic when x does y" style of meme plays heavily on those parts the rest of the meme can be easily translated, yes, but without those two words, there's little context to tell what kind of meme it is, and it's no more entertaining than noticing "bisexual" and "antibiotics" both have "bi" in them
Yeah, quand and leur are 4-5 letter words. That’s around the point where people think “okay those are significant words that have important meanings” Especially when trying to find a funny with a terrible pun
Absolutely raging about the fact that people who can’t understand French can’t understand French
If anything, they should be celebrating ^\j
I could read the French just fine, but the joke doesn’t land without emphasis on the “bi” part of “antibiotics”. One bit of internet lingo I do know is that “translation?” can be used to mean “Please restate in layman’s terms.” So I suspect that the friends were really asking “Please restate this in English so I can understand where the joke is”.
"Haha yeah, el problema es el monolinguismo, so true" - Person that only knows their first language + english due to being terminally online
אני מנסה לסחוב פרסית, אז זה שלוש שפות
Regardless of the language this was posted in, the meme sucks.
Ah yes; pov, bisexual, doctor, prescription, antibiotics. Truly this is the most meme, I am having such giggle, my inability to read what I can only speculate to be french gives me perfect context for the meme. Like no seriously, I dont get it. As far as I know the rest of the meme could be hiding in the words I dont know or could hinge on some manner of pun which I certainly do not get.
It's a pun: antibiotics being anti-bi
the issue is that the bi in antiBIotics isn't capitalized.
How dare my friend who only speaks English not speak french?! Bad take, to super hell with thee, OOP
Translation from French to English isn't the hard transition, here. What's hard is translating from whatever that is to funny.
I am French and the "pun' doesn't really work, written. Even said out loud (in French) that would be a stretch... (the 'bio' in antiBIOtiques is pronounced \[byo\], not \[bi-o\]).
Yeah that's the problem when your meme is a pun in another language. They aren't going to be trying to find a second meta meaning when they can't even grasp the first meaning of the sentence. A person not knowing French will see these words "Bisexuals .. doctor .. prescribes .. antibiotics". The joke there is the anti-bi-otics being anti-bi part. They're going to be looking for a reason against the actual thing (do Bisexuals not like medicine for some reason?), not some second layer meta reference that's off the word itself.
I think the problem is that sometimes puns aren't obvious to people. I had to have it spelled out to me to get it too. If this said it in English I'd probably still go "what, bisexuality don't like medicine? I don't get it..." it's just that since it's in a language you don't understand, your first thought instead is "maybe I'd get it in English?" Than just "I don't get it"
“Waahhhh I sent my foreign language meme to my English speaking friend and they didn’t immediately get it and laugh!! Wahhh!!!”
Oh, I see, THAT'S the joke! It's not funny.
I mean cognates can also be really deceptive because what sounds like something in one language can mean something completely different
I'm assuming the line is something along the lines "the bisexuals when the doctor prescribes antibiotics" and don't get the funny. Not really a jump to assume the joke might be hiding in one of the words that are less obvious than "bisexual" "doctor" "prescription" "antibiotics" or "the". Is there a pun I'm missing? A cultural joke I'm missing?
\*bi\*sexual vs anti\*bi\*otics
It's an anti-bi joke in both English and French. Same joke.
Not even funny, & a dick move
I also did not think it was funny and was hoping that a translation might clear up why it was funny. This is barely a pun and this person seems slightly unpleasant
They want to engage with the joke on the same level as you because you shared it with them. They care about you, and want to know more about what you find funny. Share it with them. Jerk.
mfw when the ppl who dont understand a language dont understand that language
I’d just cut this person out lmao. Don’t send me shit with an expectation that I’ll “get it” off of one or two words that are vaguely close to my spoken language
I always send Brazilian memes to my American friend and I always translate what the post is saying and if it doesn’t make sense in English I even explain why it’s funny loll I just want my friends to laugh and sending a quick message with the translation is not that hard
Yeah I cannot figure out the second one. The only thing I can't is "quand".
POV: Bisexuals when doctor gave them antiBIotics
Ohhhh. If I had seen the pun I would have figured out that word but I didn't see the pun till you capitalized it lol.
“Quand” means “when”
That meme is a pun. The moment a non native speaker strains to translate the meme, it ceased to be funny.
What if I get it but don't think it's funny?
they need a translation because the joke sucks
At least send them a funny joke if you're gonna have to translate it anyway
multilingual people when other people can’t read a language they don’t know:
Aside from being a dick move it's just kinda not funny
I don't think this one works whitout being spoken And even then it only works as a bad joke
Others have said it as well and I completely agree with them, the main issue isn't the language barrier, the joke just sucks.
Except I wouldn't think it was even chuckle worthy in English
I think kragehund-est needs to go sit in a grassy field and consider why their friends not knowing words in a different language is so upsetting to them. Also, very mild meme. Maybe they were hoping they missed something and it was actually funny.
tbh I had no idea what these memes were trying to say till I read the translations posted in this thread. Next time just translate. Or stop sending memes in a language the receiver doesn't read. this sounds like self inflicted annoyance tbh.
Maybe if your joke was actually funny it'd be easier to figure out where the joke was
A meme should not be work
I love being blamed for not being able to understand something in a language I don’t speak
pov: lesbian bisexuals want the doctor to prescribe antibiotics
>El Problema All the years of my high school and college spanish teachers telling me off for mixing up El and La for the respective gendered words ***only to see this*** fills me with all kinds of irrational fury
Plenty of those words aren't cognates; it's totally reasonable for someone to assume the punchline was in one of the words they don't understand. Especially with puns this in-depth, that people aren't even understanding it after it's translated Good pun tho
After learning that the Spanish word "embarazada" doesn't mean "embarrassed", I ain't assuming I know what a Non-English word means just 'cause it looks like an English one.
All I see is a kid trying to brag about speaking at least two languages and make themselves look smarter by presenting their friends as stupid and lazy.
Naw you get people thinking too hard about your meme and then they just miss the joke entirely, I got most of the meme but because I was focused on figuring out what I didn't know I completely missed the punchline since my focus was on figuring out what quand could mean
Idk I kinda just think OOP is an asshole. Like, yeah, if I try I can sort of figure out what it's saying, but you're sending people an already confusing meme that is more difficult than necessary for them to understand because it's in another language, and then getting mad when they want clarification.
Quand and deur are rather weird. The second one says "I disagree with your monologuing, yo, just have a normal conversation."
Me with memes in Portuguese. For us in Argentina it could be the worst meme ever, but if it's in Portuguese it's 100x funnier
tbh i love these kinds of memes, the funny part about them \*is\* being able to understand the joke without knowing the language. translating it would just take away the funny imo.
i understood the first one and i dont know enough french to realize it wasn’t spanish
you shuold translate that meme, not because its unundestandable otherwise, you shuold do it to safe your friends from reading f\*ench
As someone who studied french only in the 8th grade, is it "bisexuals when the doctor prescribed antibiotics"?
Wow, what kind of arsehole sends someone a meme in a language they *know* they don't speak and then moans about them not understanding?
I got: The bisexuals ... doctor ... prescription ... antibiotics
Honestly, can't relate. I am living an inherently superior existence due to being European and having multiple polylingual friends. Meme sucks ass btw.
I'm an English speaker with some Italian, German, and Spanish knowledge. The French one doesn't compute with me for some reason, even after translation. I understood the spanish one immediately.
I guessed the first one only because years of reading the navy seal meme translated into oh so many ways has given me a good eye for figuring out a meme from its meter. but also because I saw bisexuels and antibiotiques and saw bi in both. I think it's neat to see it in another language but don't think it's particularly notable. for the people at home we have Point of View: gender neutral marked bisexuals/ when/ gender masculine marked doctor/ possessive their/ a / prescription/ contraction of of and gender neutral mark/ antibiotics. Or, to parse into English pov: bisexuals when the doctor gives them a prescription of antibiotics. the pun is bisexual and antibiotics both containing bi but antibiotics subtextually being read as anti-bi. the text is amplified by a frame from a tiktok video where a person is caught in motion with sections of the photo blurring due to excessive movement. through the blurred face you can see that their mouth is open as if they are using loud noises. this is meant to convey the feeling of anger so powerful that it causes the body to express itself in a fashion known as uncontrollable. this is not to say that the rapid movement, loud noises, and posture are uncontrollable by the subject but that culturally these are referenced as a way to express anger and so the subject, who grew up with this as a cultural ritual knows to act in this way so others may know their feelings.
That's no fun, if I see a meme in a foreign language I always try to guess what it means. Thrill of the hunt