The Unemployed Friend Meme Perfectly Encapsulates Being In Your 20s
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The Unemployed Friend Meme Perfectly Encapsulates Being In Your 20s

Zoe Kramer January 5, 2023

The Unemployed Friend meme, also known as the Unemployed Friend At 2pm on a Monday, has made the rounds of social media, becoming a new favourite phrase to comment underneath a video or photo. The trend has caught on for a reason — it’s fun to observe how even within a single friend group people can be living completely different lifestyles. One person might be living the university life, another could be working 9 to 5, and a third might not be working. It can feel at times like everyone is living in different worlds that occasionally intersect, and this chaotic disparity is the perfect way to describe life in your 20s.

There has been a definite stigma against unemployed people, and even though this trend makes light of unemployment, there’s no sense of judgment against those who don’t have jobs. What makes the meme relatable is that most all of us have been the unemployed friend at one point or other. It shows the struggles that can come with that, the feelings of frustration or the sense of being purposeless. But it also shows how not working can give you time to find yourself and have great adventures. Ultimately, we’re all more than our capacity to be productive, and this meme is a great reminder of that.

Photo by photo nic on Unsplash

See also: How To Do the TikTok Zoolander Meme and Some Great Examples

Unemployed Friend Meme Examples

If you haven’t come across the meme before, or if you loved it so much that you want to see more, look no further. The meme has been adopted in a multitude of different formats. Some videos as just from the perspective of the unemployed friend, as they go hiking or otherwise see the world. Other videos are from the perspective of a person at work, with the mundanity of their day to day life juxtaposed with the adventurous, wild or strange events happening in their unemployed friend’s life, either shown through a phone call or on their story. Other videos turn the unemployed friend into a character who struggles with filling the endless time on their hands and always comes to talk to their employed friend while they’re working.

It’s a pretty simple setup, but it’s something that nearly everyone can relate to. It’s fun to see the different twists that people put on the original concept, with each variation adding something new. So without further ado, here are some of the best examples of the Unemployed Friend meme.

See also: The Best Memes of 2022

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Zoe Kramer has been writing for GRV Media’s student-centric website Freshered since October 2022 and is now also contributing to HITC. She graduated from Cardiff University in 2022 with a BA in Journalism, Media and English Literature. During her time in university, she worked for her student newspaper as well as completing an internship with a book publisher. She has also written and continues to write book and theatre reviews. She is excited to now be pursuing a career as a journalist and learning something new every day. In particular, she loves writing about student life, books, the Internet, and travel. Originally from the United States, she is enjoying living abroad in the UK.