- "When the US government asks for my birth certificate
so they can draft me for World War 3. I'm 12."
- (both laugh) ♪ (punk rock intro) ♪
- (reporter) World War 3 is beginning to trend...
- Oh, no. - Yeah, I've seen a bunch
of World War 3 memes on social media.
- (reporter) ...to a new level. Soleimani was the leader...
- I realize we haven't talked about this.
I feel like we've probably individually seen a lot about it,
but we haven't really talked about it.
- (reporter) In 2018, President Donald Trump
broke the Iran nuclear deal. - Yeah, that was kind of
a big thing, wasn't it? That was definitely a bigger move
by Trump himself. - (reporter) Trump then reinstated
financial and economic sanctions... - He trying to reverse
everything Obama did. (chuckles) - I know.
- (reporter) ...a terrorist organization.
Iran attacked... - Yeah, this has been going on
for a while. - (reporter) ...in the Gulf region
among other things and the tit-for... - This is...
Yeah. (sighs) - (reporter) ...the US killing
of Soleimani. - I need all the details I can get.
It's kind of hidden under all the memes
that I see instead. - Kind of misinformed basically.
- Yeah, I'm very misinformed, because all I see
are the Twitter memes. - I feel like there might
be something, but it's not gonna be as big as a whole world war, you know?
Maybe a little bit of fighting, but I doubt in hell
that there's gonna be a whole world war
just based on this. - (FBE) So, that was a video
briefly explaining the recent events that have occurred the US and Iran,
which have obviously stirred up a lot of controversial conversations,
including discussions about the possibility
of a World War 3. Many people quickly turned
to the internet to make and share memes about it,
so we're gonna get your thoughts on some of those today.
- They're pretty funny too, some of them.
- "Iran versus USA. 2020 is gonna be my year.
World War 3 is trending on the third day."
- Yeah, that was-- that was literally the first meme
of the decade. - Wow. So much happened
in the first three days, it just seemed like, "Okay,
this year is not gonna be very great." - I mean, they're funny,
but then again still kinda scary. I mean, that's the way
we feel about it, and none of us wanna go to war.
- Kids just don't understand the seriousness of it, I guess,
because I think they're just misinformed
and they don't know the reason behind it.
- (Khloe) It's not my fault... - "Me and the girls
when we steal a tank in World War 3."
- (chuckles) - Oh my gosh! That is so funny!
- Dude, TikTok is so good. - (chuckles)
- (laughs) - (Kim) Oh my god! Oh my god!
Oh my-- - Oh, Keeping Up With the Kardashians.
That's funny. - It was such a quick meme
that it just blew up so fast. I was like, "Whoa."
My whole "For You" page on TikTok was just all World War 3 memes.
- "Me having no [bleep] idea what I'm doing in #WWIII."
Oh my god. - He's a clown.
He's like, "I'm a clown. I don't know what I'm doing."
(laughs) "They just recruited me."
- It's like these memes have a little truth.
- It's humorous, but is it making fun of our military?
What do you think? - It's true. Eh.
- No? - But he's just saying he has no idea
what's going on. - I think it's less scary
for Americans, because a war doesn't feel like it comes here.
We always-- it always goes there. So, imagine the people--
it always breaks my heart for the people in foreign countries.
- These kinds of memes seem to take over social media platforms
including Twitter, Instagram, Reddit, and TikTok.
And at some point, meme creators started to explore
the possibility of a military draft, so we're gonna show you
some of those memes now. - Draft.
- Okay, draft, draft. - Those are the best ones,
especially the TikToks. (chuckles) Those are funny.
- (man) Ha-ha. - (both laugh)
- I've seen that. - He said, "I'm laughing
at the memes, but low-key I'm scared as hell." (laughs)
- (man) Ha-ha. - That's very funny.
- This one is probably the most appropriate.
- Yeah. - Yeah. I think that illustrates
exactly what the problem is. Right now, everyone's just kind of
laughing and confused, but when the reality hits,
if the reality hits, the joke's over.
- I'm almost within that age range. - I don't see a draft happening.
- I mean, it could. - Eh, I don't see it.
- That's why everyone's scared. - I'm not old enough,
so it's not really that big a deal to me.
But I would want to just protec-- - You would want to what?
- To protect the country. - Okay.
Well, there's-- you still have... - When I'm 18.
- ...the opportunity to do that. You don't have to be drafted.
You can volunteer. - Yeah, that's true.
- "Gays when we get drafted." - I saw this! (claps)
- Oh my god! That's so hilarious. - (squeals)
- (both laugh) - That's a really good one!
♪ (upbeat music) ♪ - (snickers)
- God bless America. - (laughs)
- All right. So, the topic is certainly sensitive,
but that was a damn good dance. - They'd probably be making TikToks
in World War 3 to be honest. - That's a good one.
- (chuckles) - "When the US government asks
for my birth certificate, so they can draft me for World War 3.
I'm 12." - (both laugh)
- I'd make a fake ID and be like, "Yo, I'm 11." (chuckles)
- It's kind of true, though! We don't wanna get drafted!
And a lot of the people that are making the memes
are actually the ones that... - That are scared.
- ....that are really scared. They're just like,
"Please stay away from me!" - Ah, bench warmers.
Well, I just feel like they don't have that much--
they don't really care what happens, 'cause if they cared,
they would go out and protect the country.
- "If World War 3's starting and women want equal rights so bad,
we should start drafting them too." And then--
- Right? - And then-- (chuckles)
- (laughs) - I saw this one.
(claps) I did one like this! This is one that I did!
- Be like, "You know what? We're gonna do it,
what the wives and the women are supposed to do then."
- (both laugh) - "We'll listen to y'all."
- "We're gonna get to work." - No hate on anybody
who's creating memes about this or anything,
but personally, I can't just joke about something like this.
- Memes have evolved, 'cause it's always been in response
to whatever's popular, and that's how you're gonna get viewed
just because it's on a popular subject.
And it's become so common. It's like, "Okay, this is trending,
this is trending. Make a meme. Something's funny,"
that an event like this falls into it and the machine
just continue to crank. I don't think the filters apply
for people to realize this requires focus.
This is very serious. - Yeah.
- Instead it's just, "Okay, what's going on this week?
What have we got on the list?" And so, they're just cranking it out.
- (FBE) The reaction to these memes has been mixed with many saying
that they are using humor to cope with their fears about war
while others have expressed their concern about making light
of such a serious situation as seen in the following tweets.
- (both) Okay. - "Yeah, not gonna lie,
this 'We joke to get us through trauma' thing
ain't applicable this time lol. It's not your trauma to joke about."
Yeah, I get this. So, for some people,
it's definitely way more real than we assume it to be,
but I think telling people to stop isn't really gonna do much.
- It's different times, you know? It's just 2020, man. People--
- The internet. - People are gonna joke
about everything, you know. - People don't take stuff
seriously nowadays. - If we're afraid, whatever works
at this point. - Actually, I agree.
If you're afraid, whatever works. - It's just going over
their heads right now. They're not processing it correctly,
but that's like every teenager in the world to be honest.
- "Americans are making a joke out of something that will kill
millions here in the Middle East. Our lives are in danger.
We are worried about our future. This is disgusting."
"Gays on their way to the trenches (chuckles) during World War"--
I feel bad for laughing. (laughs) - It's a joke for a reason.
It's made to laugh at not take seriously in most situations.
- You can imagine if you're on the other side
that they have... - Yeah, because they have--
- ...you know, their own concerns about how something serious
could be looked at so lightly. - True.
- See, us in America, you know what I mean,
we see what's going on in the news and we hear that,
but we really can't feel their pain like they are.
They're like, "We got family there. I've been there."
- And seeing these things is just scaring me even more,
because I'm like, what do I do about this situation
that's going on right now, though? - I can tell you this.
I can remember when I was a senior in high school,
and Bush Sr. was escalating what was going on
in the Middle East at the time with Iraq.
I had a history teacher who came in just cackling
in the middle of the afternoon and said, "Boys,
I hope you like picking sand fleas out of your boots,
'cause you're all going to the east." - That joke, terrible as it was,
actually made us all suddenly realize the significance of the situation
that we were in. Fortunately, the pendulum swings,
and things balanced out. I know that it feels like
there's a possibility of World War 3, but I have some confidence
that this will balance out again. - (FBE) We wanna start off
by saying that this topic has been very polarizing online,
but we have a unique opportunity today to get the perspective
of both teens and their parents. As you can see,
the topic of World War 3 has been one of the most talked about
and memed things to happen this year so far.
Obviously, the possibility of a new world war
is scary and dangerous. Why do you think so many people
turned it into a humorous meme? - Well, I just think it's a way
to cope with the situation, because obviously we know it's awful
and it's possible that something might happen.
But if we can make light of such a dark subject,
then it'll at least get us through it. - Because here we go about our lives
on a regular basis and don't see bombs, you know,
exploding in front of us or near us,
everything turns into a joke to Americans.
And this is actually kind of a serious thing that's happening
in the world. - They don't wanna face reality.
Yeah, there's a possibility of a World War 3 going on,
but that's scary to think about it, so let's not think about it.
- We make a joke out of everything. Like SNL, they're making jokes
about all this stuff, you know what I mean?
People are laughing, carrying on, laughing about Donald Trump.
"Oh, Donald Trump," you know, this stuff.
Like, yo, he's the president. All he gotta do is push
a couple buttons and say a couple things,
and we gonna shoot a couple missiles off.
- We don't know. We don't know the situations
that supposedly led to the moment we're in right now.
We don't know what's going to happen two days from now,
and that makes it even more uncomfortable.
But it also gives you a little license to where you can make fun of it
or at least be humorous. - I understand where these people
are coming from. That's not how I personally
am trying to cope with this right now. We're all just really trying
to just understand what's going on
and figuring out how to deal with that.
- (FBE) The United States has been kind of going through this idea
of this war on terrorism and this war for kind of
a long time. - This has been going on
probably since the Biblical days. - (FBE) Yeah.
- (chuckles) Before we was born. This was going on
for all over hundreds of years. - (FBE) As someone who has seen
how the United States and the world reacted to those events,
how would you compare the response to a possible World War 3
to the threats of war when you were growing up?
- Well, I think the whole idea of memes, I think, is just
because everybody has access to it now.
So many people have access to a computer and can generate
these memes, where we've probably done similar things,
just didn't have the technology, so we had till the nighttime comics
put together a routine. And they reached a lot of people
by doing their thing on TV. - We have to have some sort of comedy,
some sort of laughter in this generation,
'cause the older generation was definitely grieving
and depression was hitting. And I think sometimes we have
to have some of the light. - You see everything in a quickness.
Back then, we wouldn't know until we turn on the TV or the radio.
You know, we wouldn't know anything. And we'd only hear from the people
that are on the radio or on the news.
Now, everybody has a say about everything.
- (FBE) So, many articles have pointed the anger
surrounding the memes specifically towards Gen Z
as they are one of the most active generations
on social media and are responsible for a lot of the memes
like the ones you saw today. As a teenager, how do you feel
about the blame being pointed at you but also do you feel
that your generation just has a different outlook on things
than your parents? - It's stupid.
If something is awful, we try to make light
of that subject. We don't try to just say,
"Oh, this is awful," just look at it in an awful way.
We try to make light of it. I mean, that's all we can really do.
- To blame our generation for the jokes, yeah, sure.
But is it really that much of a bad thing?
Deep down, we're kinda scared. You know, just a little.
And the memes definitely help reassure us.
- A lot of people in my generation aren't as educated and don't know
a lot of the backstories and how war actually works,
so that's probably why we're joking about it.
And I feel like all the generations or whoever should be mad at us,
because we probably don't know as much as they do.
- For a lot of people my age, we either weren't born for 9/11
or we weren't really old enough to really be in it
and understand what was going on, so this is kind of
the first real scare of a global crisis
that I've really had to deal with. - We definitely have
a different outlook on what our parents do,
'cause if I show her a meme, she'll always be like, "What?
What? I don't get it. What does that mean?"
- You know that meme that you guys would say,
"OK boomer," I feel like everything
that you guys do that we don't agree on,
you guys are always gonna be like, "OK boomer."
But I mean, there is a generation gap, so I don't really blame them for it,
because we just grew up in different eras.
- (FBE) So finally, whether you agree
with these World War 3 memes or not, what would you wanna say to the people
who are creating the memes? - That's a tough one. (laughs)
- Just be a little more sensitive when you create them
towards the people that are out there. So, when you create 'em,
just think of both sides. That's all.
- If that's what makes you happy, then keep doing what you're doing.
I know there's people out there that are very angry at you,
but if this is what's helping you at ease,
then continue to... - I say if you like making them,
keep making them. - And I would just have to say
that one of the things that makes our country great
is that we have the ability to do these things
and we have the opportunity to discuss our differences
and whether or not we like them or not.
I suppose that if somebody is creating things you don't like,
then you have the chance to turn 'em off.
- Make sure that you're happy right now.
Be with the people that you care about,
like just spend quality time with the people that you love.
This is a really tough time, and this is a really big issue
to have to go through, and you really shouldn't
have to deal with it alone, so... yeah.
- I can't step on that. That's perfect.
- Thanks for watching this episode... - Of Teens and Parents React.
- If you liked this video... - Make sure you give it a like.
- What are your thoughts on World War 3 memes?
- Let us know in the comments. - (both) Peace!
- Hey, y'all! FBE producer Blythe here.
Wanna catch up on all of our latest videos?
Well then, subscribe to our channel and get here early
and you might even get to talk to me in the first 30 minutes. Bye!