I Don't Take Normal College Graduation Photos

About

I Don't Take Normal College Graduation Photos refers to a copypasta on Twitter paired with humorous images. The copypasta is a parody of a tweet by a Turning Point USA employee who posted the text with a picture of her with a gun in her pants. The meme is employed in a similar manner to Before The Liberals Find a Reason to Deface This Statue… and The Left Loves Art.

Origin

On April 7th, 2018, Twitter user and Turning Point USA employee @BrennaSpencer posted an image of herself wearing a "Women for Trump" shirt lifted to expose her midriff and a gun sticking out of her pants.^[1] She captioned the photo "I don’t take normal college graduation photos…" The tweet gained over 6,000 retweets and 52,000 likes (shown below).

Spread

Twitter users quickly began mocking the image. Some users pointed out a recent trend of women such as Tomi Lahren taking photos of themselves with guns sticking out of their pants. Twitter user @mendit_wyou made the comparison in a Choose Your Fighter joke, gaining over 200 retweets and 1,500 likes (shown below, left). Twitter user @KrangTNelson tweeted images of Lahren, Spencer, and a third woman posing with guns in their pants with the caption "horrifically blasting my crotch to absolute shreds to own the libs", gaining 2,000 retweets and 12,000 likes (shown below, right).

Meanwhile, parodies of the tweet spread through Twitter as people posted Spencer's original caption with different, humorous pictures. For example, Mark Hoppus of Blink-182 tweeted a parody, gaining over over 840 retweets and 4,900 likes (shown below, left). Twitter user @yeetztweetz tweeted an image of a child doing an awkward dance, gaining over 220 retweets and 3,100 likes (shown below, right).

Gun Advocates Response

In addition to the memes created in parody, the parody also inspired discussion amongst gun rights activists and conservatives. Some argued that while they were pro-gun, they did not approve of Spencer using the weapon to make a political point. User @Osellr stated "brandishing a firearm for a photo shoot or showing it off to try and look cool is just stupid. They are tools," gaining over 700 retweets (shown below, left). User @DadForChange said that using the gun to make a political point is irresponsible gun ownership, gaining over 220 retweets (shown below, right).

Other guns-rights activists encouraged Spencer's picture. Activist Antonia Okafor posted a picture of herself copying the pose, gaining over 1,500 retweets (shown below, left). Charlie Kirk of Turning Point USA tweeted his support of Spencer's photo as well (shown below, right). The gun activist's responses were covered by Twitter Moments.^[2]

Various Examples

Search Interest

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External References