For Real / Fr Fr

Submission 20,573

Part of a series on Internet Slang. [View Related Entries]

About

For Real, also written as the abbreviation FR or FR FR, is a slang term that translates to being serious about something, as in telling the truth, related to hip-hop diction. Although it dates back to the early 2000s, the phrase wasn't used en masse until after 2010 on Twitter and Vine, becoming more notable in the early 2020s amid its usage by Zoomers and its ironic usage in the Zoomerification trend related to the Zoomer Perm.

Origin

According to The Dictionary of American Slang: Fourth Edition^[1] by Barbara Ann Kipfer, PhD. and Robert L. Chapman, Ph.D., the slang term "For Real" has Yiddish origins and dates back to the 1940s in America. It's said to be based on the Yiddish term, "for true?" In the 1960s, it was first added to the Dictionary of American Slang when it was popularized by comedian Jerry Lewis within his stand-up sets.^[1]

Online History

On January 4th, 2003, the term "For Real" was added to Urban Dictionary ^[2] by the user Anonymous, which received over 590 likes in 19 years. They defined it as, "are you serious" (shown below, left). On October 28th, 2003, Urban Dictionary^[3] user Curt Custer added the abbreviation "fr" to the website, receiving over 480 likes in 19 years (shown below, right).

On July 28th, 2010, Antoine Dodson in his Bed Intruder, or "Hide Yo Kids, Hide Yo Wife," interview said "for real," becoming a notable moment in the viral video. This meme helped for real become a more notable term in meme culture.

As early as 2008, "For Real" was used in tweets.^[4] The abbreviation "Fr Fr," wasn't used until December 2010, however, when multiple Twitter^[5] users began writing it. The first tweet^[6] using the phrase "fr fr" to reach over 1,000 likes was posted on July 29th, 2014, by Twitter^[6] user miilkkk, being a quote retweet of a Vine stating, "Her & her dad gotta good relationship fr fr 😂😂💉💯💘💘," which earned roughly 1,200 likes over the course of eight years.

In fact, the eventual, mainstream awareness of "fr fr" was aided by its usage on Vine, alluded by a different 2014 tweet^[7] that reached over 1,000 likes posted by Viner Aaron Carpenter on September 9th, 2014. It earned roughly 4,900 likes in eight years (shown below).

Going into the remainder of the 2010s, tweets and memes using "for real" increased in overall engagement. For instance, on August 24th, 2017, Twitter^[8] user BillRatchet posted a tweet about a possible Catfish, using "for real" in its caption and earning roughly 27,100 likes over the course of five years (shown below, left). On June 12th, 2020, Twitter^[9] user qreativemind_ tweeted, "If you can’t run barefoot on concrete you ain’t country for real," earning roughly 76,000 likes over the course of two years (shown below, right).

Zoomerification

Zoomerification, also known as Zoomerify, refers to a trend where meme creators edit notable characters or figures to have Zoomer Hair, as well as insert captions including Gen Z slang terms like "fr fr," "deadass," "bussin" and "no cap."

On April 14th, 2022, Twitter^[10] user based schizo (@tulpapilled) posted an edit of a still image from the Business Card scene in the 2000 film American Psycho in which Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale) was given a Zoomer Perm haircut. The image was accompanied by altered dialogue from the scene, in which many words were replaced with Gen Z slang. The tweet (shown below) gained over 860 retweets and 9,600 likes in two months.