X Keep Moving, This Is a Y Neighborhood

Submission 3,536

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

About

X Keep Moving, This Is a Y Neighborhood is a phrasal template used in a series of memes based on a historic black-and-white photograph of a homeowner pointing at an anti-Japanese sign displayed on their house. The image has been used as an exploitable since 2015 and gained more prevalence in the early 2020s, typically being used to create memes favoring one fandom or character over another.

Origin

In 1923, the Hollywood Association started a campaign to expel the Japanese from their community in the U.S. On May 23rd, 1923, an unknown photographer took a picture of Hollywood resident Mrs. B.G. Miller standing outside her house and pointing at a sign reading "Japs keep moving, this is a white man's neighborhood" installed above the porch.^[1] The photograph was archived by the Bettman Archive and was used in multiple articles and blog posts online.^[2]^[3]

On June 30th, 2009, the Avid Editor^[4] blog posted the earliest known meme based on the image, a demotivational poster (shown below, left).

On January 23rd, 2015, an anonymous 4chan /a/^[5] user posted the earliest known edit that used the text on the sign as a phrasal template and replaced the woman with the anime character Rikka Tanakashi to create a meme about weebs and normies that was frequently reposted on /a/ and other boards in the following years (shown below, right).

Spread

The photograph saw occasional use as a meme format on 4chan in the late 2010s. For example, on December 23rd, 2018, an anonymous user posted a 30-Year-Old Boomer meme in a /pol/^[6] thread (shown below, left). On April 19th, 2019, a user posted a version of the meme about furries and monster girls (shown below, right). On September 14th, 2020, iFunny^[7] user YourBoyAlucard reposted the monster girls version, with the post gaining over 2,500 smiles in three years.

Following the initial spread on 4chan, the meme format achieved virality on iFunny in the early 2020s. For example, on February 12th, 2020, iFunny^[8] user Gator posted a meme that received over 4,800 smiles in three years (shown below, left). On December 21st, 2020, iFunny^[9] user WesternSwing posted a The Year Without a Santa Claus meme that received over 2,500 smiles in three years (shown below, right).

The format maintained its popularity on iFunny and 4chan in 2022 and 2023, primarily being used to make memes favoring one character or fandom over another.