• NotSteve_@piefed.ca
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      7 hours ago

      XKCD made me aware of the fact that this sorta joke has been going on since way before any of us were born. 23 skidoo is an old trendy phrase that’s made up of two jokes that mean nothing definable on their own

      Today’s 67 is 1899’s 23

      From the XKCD alt text:

      In 1899, people were walking around shouting `23’ at each other and laughing, and confused reporters were writing articles trving to figure out what it meant.

      • Midnight Wolf@lemmy.world
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        8 hours ago

        Carefully observe how the above argument lacks any supporting argument or information.

        Curious.

          • Passerby6497@lemmy.world
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            3 hours ago

            When asked by Complex[7] about the meaning of the numbers, Skrilla said, “Everybody else got their own different meaning. But for me, it’s just ‘negative to positive.’ It helped me turn from a negative person to a positive person.”

            In a comment to the Wall Street Journal[11] from the same timeframe, he also said, “I never put an actual meaning on it, and I still would not want to … That’s why everybody keeps saying it.”

            So it’s a number repeated in a song that the artist says has no meaning, instead of it just being a meaningless number.

            Glad you helped clear that up. Way to prove everyone wrong.

      • lugal@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        8 hours ago

        I would argue that it has an origin but lost its meaning since the people who use it don’t know the meaning. At this point, it’s more than anything a cultural signifier which isn’t a new thing either. People try to belong to an ingroup and adopt their insider even if only as marker of that group.