How Do Y'all Walk in Shallow Water

Submission 5,481

About

How Y'all Walk in Shallow Water refers to a viral Twitter debate where participants submitted drawings of their preferred method of wading or swimming through shallow water. The thread, created by user @jdebbiel, went viral on Twitter in late March 2022.

Origin

On March 27th, 2022, Twitter^[1] user @jdebbiel tweeted two images of a person wading through shallow water, one simply walking through it and the other crouching so that only their head stays above the surface, writing, "how do y’all walk in shallow water." The tweet received over 42,600 retweets and 378,600 likes in one week (tweet and images shown below).

Spread

Starting that same day on March 27th, 2022, Twitter users replied with other options for wading through shallow water. For example, a sketch drawing posted^[2] by @la_zalmoncha received over 3,800 retweets and 59,100 likes in one week (shown below, left). On March 28th, Twitter^[3] user @calplsevdailis posted a Moses joke that received over 420 retweets and 14,700 likes in one week (shown below, center). Another drawing shared^[4] by @ToastyHashBrown on the same day gained over 420 retweets and 13,200 likes in the same period (shown below, right).

On March 30th, 2022, Redditor^[5] whitemike40 posted a screenshot of the tweet to the /r/meirl subreddit, where it received over 162,000 upvotes in six days. On March 31st, 2022, Redditor^[6] Lighteye783 added an additional panel to the image, with the post gaining over 142,000 upvotes in five days (shown below, center). Later that day, Redditor^[7] PureAwesome added yet another panel, with the image gaining over 6,800 upvotes in the /r/dankmemes subreddit (shown below, right).

On April 1st, 2022, Twitter^[8] account @RespectfulMemes reposted PureAwesome's image, with the post gaining over 35,500 retweets and 286,000 likes in three days, with users yet again replying with drawings.^[9]