Hands up for the “silence X, a Y is talking” meme
“Silence X, a Y is talking” is an exploitable image meme featuring King Baldwin IV from the film Kingdom of Heaven raising his hand with the corresponding caption. Those using the meme replace “X’ and “Y” with various titles and descriptions most often to make a point about how some people talk over others despite having little expertise on the subject matter at hand.
The original form of the meme seemed to address Christians who speak over members of the Jewish faith or ethnicity, and it spread across Twitter from there.
What is the “silence X, a Y is talking” meme?
The 2024 meme uses an image of the character King Baldwin IV in his white robe and head covering with a silvery mask holding up one hand to stop someone from talking. In the original, the top caption reads “SILENCE, JEW” and the bottom caption reads “A Christian is talking.”
This image responded to Twitter user David Novák, who had posted a message declaring that Christians who “hate Jews” are not really Christian.
“If you hate Jews - God's chosen nation - or anyone else, for that matter, you are not Christian,” he said. “Yes, Christ is the King but saying it doesn't mean you are His follower - you need to actually follow his teachings. Read the Bible and repent.”
The quote tweeter, @consciousphilos, appeared to be claiming that Novák was speaking over Jewish individuals to make this point. The bio of this account, however, calls the owner an “Orthodox Christian” and “pro-white.” It’s therefore hard to say whether it was criticism of the original tweet or if it was meant to command Jewish people to be silent. Regardless, others began to use the meme format with a more optimistic purpose in mind.
“Silence X, a Y is talking” meme origins
The film Kingdom of Heaven, from which the meme image originates, is an epic historical drama directed by Ridley Scott and released on May 6, 2005, to general audiences. It depicts the events leading to the Third Crusade—a period of heavy religious violence launched by Christian monarchs that lasted from the years 1189 to 1192.
People have used the scene with King Baldwin IV raising his hand for silence as a meme in the past.
On March 30, 2024, a gamer TikTok account posted a video using a looped compilation of short clips from Kingdom of Heaven that included the one with King Baldwin IV raising his hand. The caption read: "When the clutch is so fabulous you just sit there and revive your teammate like nothing happened."
@sev7enalt Clutching the 1v4 is not for everyone #fy #fortnite #baldwin #fortnitememes #gaming #friendship #baldwiniv #kingbaldwin ♬ original sound - braylon ????????
From that point on, more TikTok videos appeared using the scene to emphasize the satisfaction of solid victory and other situations.
The original post of the "silence X, a Y is talking" meme format appeared on Twitter on June 5, 2024. It has so far received over 334,000 views and 9,500 likes.
Spread
As June wore on, other Twitter users began to appropriate the meme format, replacing "Jew" and "Christian" with other terms and phrases, including "engineer" and "ideas guy." Soon, people started switching out the term "talking" with other verbs, and the meme spread over to Tumblr by June 8 and Facebook by June 11.
Silence X, A Y is talking memes:
Related memes:
- The ‘no meme’ (for when you need help you say ‘no’)
- These Christian memes for Jesus are especially dank
- James Woods’ tweet launches a meme about terrible statues
- No, Facebook isn’t banning ‘honk’ after white nationalist meme
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