By: Sherry – 8th grade
In China’s social media, a simple sentence is influencing China’s teenagers: “Love you, dear ‘myself’, see you tomorrow!” It’s like a kind word to ourselves. This meme is from a simple video on TikTok. A blogger complained in her video that she didn’t want to peel the grapefruit, but she really wanted to eat the grapefruit too. At last, she peeled it, because the ‘dear myself’ wanted to eat it, and she said, “Love you, dear ‘myself ‘, see you tomorrow.” She sees herself as an old friend, ’dear myself ’, and finished this little in a kindly action. This video triggered many people’s resonated with many people, especially teenagers.’ Love You Myself relies on its humor and kindness and has become a reconciliation.
From game characters to cultural symbols, this meme’s origin is a famous game called 《League of Legends, there is a character in it, named Sett. This character has a famous dialogue, “Love you, dear mother, see you tomorrow.” Compared to this line creates a big contrast for this character.
Why this meme popular now?
“Dear myself” is the most important key. It uses the third-person perspective to create a wonderful psychological distance. This can let you calm down and pat yourself on the shoulder in a friendly way, like a kind friend. This meme accurately captures the current stress of Chinese teenagers and their feelings. Under the society’s strict rules and pressures, “to love ourselves” is too hard and expensive to achieve. It is often a marketing method or an additional demand for teenagers. But “dear myself” is different. It is not hard and expensive to achieve, and it explains this concept in a very simple and easy way: Peel yourself a grapefruit, allow yourself to get up later, refuse an unreasonable demand……There are lots of things to do to love ourselves.
“Love you, dear, myself” is more than a meme; it’s a way to learn how to communicate with yourself, how to understand yourself, and how to love yourself. We often make mistakes, we are not perfect, but the “imperfect” is the most perfect thing.
In the whisper of “dear myself”, teenagers are practicing: How to be a better friend to themselves. The teenagers are making a positive lifestyle in a new and special way.
