420 Month

Submission 2,475

Part of a series on 420. [View Related Entries]

Overview

420 Month is a mock holiday for the entire month April 2020, referencing the code-term for cannabis consumption 420. The holiday has inspired a number of memes and posts about how in the year 2020, there will be a whole month of 420.

Background

On December 13th, 2009, Highdeas^[6] user Ironlamp posted the earliest available reference to the month-long holiday. They wrote, "I just realized that in the year 2020, for the first time in 100 years, all of April will be 420, A 420 month, this only happens once a century when a year ends in 20, So when the time comes I think we should all have a month long celebration in honor of our favorite plant." The post received more than 180 comments in less than 11 years (shown below).

Developments

On April 26th, 2012, an anonymous Yahoo Answers ^[1] user who said they saw a post about the date on Tumblr. They wrote:

I saw a post on tumblr that had the caption "In the year 2020, it'll be 4/20 for a whole month"

Can anyone explain this a bit more or am I just overthinking it?

I don't really understand what the joke is here ~

Yes, that would be the month of April and the year 20 right?

But isn't it like that for any month?

For example this month with April 25 2012. It WOULD be 4/12 on april 25, 4/12 on april 26, and 4/12 on april 27 IF YOU WERE going by the month then the date. So can someone explain this because I think I'm missing something.

Yahoo Answers^[1] user PattyM answered the question, "The year number is incremented 1 on January 1st. Thus 2019 is followed by 2020 and 2020 precedes 2021. Every year has a 4th month. 4/20 is just one way of writing the date of April, 2020. In other words yes, you are overthinking the whole thing."

Over the next decade, references to "420 month" grew in popularity, particluarly in Shower Thoughts posts. For example, on December 27th, 2014, Facebook ^[2] account "April 2020 A full month of 420" launched and posted a Sudden Clarity Clarence meme with the caption "N the year 2020 it will be 4/20 for an entire month (shown below).

People online continued to make reference to the month on various message boards and social media sites. On August 8th, 2014, Redditor ^[3] GerMexican posted "In the year 2020, 4/20 would be an entire month" in the /r/showerthoughts subreddit. The post received more than 525 points (89% upvoted) in less than six years.

On June 22nd, 2015, IGN ^[4] messageboard user sumidiotdude posted a series of images of a boy with the caption "hell yea, motherfucker" (shown below). Three years later, on March 27th, 2018, Twitter ^[5] user @WhatTheFFacts tweeted, "In 2020, 4/20 will be an entire month." Within three years, the tweet received more than 4,800 likes and 1,400 retweets (shown below, right).

In 2019, memes about the holiday grew in popularity. On April 19th, 2019, iFunny ^[7] user MiniManthur shared a Shaq's "Hot Ones" Interview meme with the caption "When you realize next year all april is 4/20." The post received more than 55,000 reactions and 1,000 comments in less than one year (shown below).