Slap in the Face

About

Slap in the Face refers to Twitter users' responses to Philip Klein's Washington Examiner op-ed piece headlined, "Elizabeth Warren's plan to cancel student loan debt would be a slap in the face to all those who struggled to pay off their loans."

Origin

On April 22nd, Philip Klein^[2] shared his op-ed piece for the Washington Examiner^[1] to Twitter attaching the headline, "New post: 'Elizabeth Warren's plan to cancel student loan debt would be a slap in the face to all those who struggled to pay off their loans'" (shown below). The tweet gained 1,400 retweets and 5,600 likes in three days.

Spread

On April 22nd, 2019, Twitter users immediately responded to the tweet by mocking its headline. Twitter user @aaronlinde^[3]
tweeted, "Not dying of polio is a slap in the face to everyone who died of polio" (shown below, left). The tweet accumulated 4,425 retweets and 18,700 likes in three days. Twitter user @JuddLegum^[4] followed suit tweeting, "New post: 'Fixing pothole is a slap in the face to all those who struggled to drive over it.'" The tweet garnered 700 retweets and 3,600 likes in three days (shown below, right).

That same day, Twitter users came up with more humorous analogies and pop reference analogies. Twitter user @SamSykesSwears^[5] tweeted, "Plans to regulate food would be a slap in the face to all those who died of salmonella" (shown below, left). The tweet gained 400 retweets and 8,700 likes in three days. @TouchlineDC^[6] tweeted, "'Plans to declare independence would be a slap in the face of all those who already paid their Stamp Tax.' – Patrick Henry's Next Door Neighbor" (shown below, right). The tweet accumulated 4,100 likes and 200 retweets in three days. Philip Klein responded to the Twitter responses by updating the article acknowledging the memes and arguing against them.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References