That One Friend That's Too Woke

Submission 2,250

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

About

That One Friend That's Too Woke refers to a screenshot of a TikTok video posted by TikToker @its.michele.ok (a Black woman wearing a green tank top making an annoyed expression in the screenshot) in which she jokes about a friend who's "too woke." The original video was posted in mid-2024, with the screenshot becoming a reaction image on Twitter / X in August 2024. It was commonly used in quotes to make fun of other tweets perceived to be "too woke." The screenshot then became an exploitable as meme creators recaptioned the text, roughly following the phrasal template That One Friend That's Too X. Creators also edited @its.michele.ok's face to match the context of their recaptions.

Origin

On June 6th, 2024, TikToker^[1] @its.michele.ok posted a video skit in which she played "That One Friend That's Too Woke." In it, her friends are laughing about the Four Seasons Orlando Baby but she's not laughing because of the state of the world. Over two months, the video received roughly 1.2 million plays and 232,200 likes (shown below).

Also on June 6th, @its.michele.ok posted the TikTok video to her X^[2] account @michele1ok, gaining over 1 million views and 25,000 likes in two months.

Spread

On June 27th, 2024, X^[3] user @shaqscorner used the video to joke about the 2024 CNN Presidential Debate, writing, "me after this debate," receiving over 220 likes in two months.

On August 20th, X^[4] user @xLvsinq used the video to quote a tweet reading, "now do it wearing only brands from those countries," gaining over 500 likes in three days (shown below).

In the following hours on August 20th, 2024, X users began using a screenshot from the video as a reaction image. The first known to do so was X^[5] user @rigby_exe__ who quoted the same tweet featured in the abovementioned post that read, "now do it wearing only brands from those countries," receiving over 70,000 likes in three days (shown below).

Later on August 20th, X^[6] user @leolaughhhhhh tweeted the image, captioning it, "when irl said I shouldn’t say taydolf swiftler," receiving over 31,000 likes in three days (shown below).

Going into late August 2024, the image was recaptioned and exploited by meme creators on X. For instance, on August 22nd, 2024, X^[7] user @bellaxedward666 shared a version in which @its.michele.ok was seen smiling with a caption reading, "That one friend that's too joyous," earning over 13,000 likes in a day (shown below).