GagBase Logo Explore

True story btw

A three-panel comic from Cyanide and Happiness satirizing educational institutions' handling of bullying. The first panel shows an interviewer asking, 'what will you do if you find a student being bullied'. The second panel features the interviewee responding, 'punish the bullied student', followed by the interviewer declaring 'you're hired' in the third panel. The bottom of the third panel is labeled '*educational institutions', implying that some institutions unjustly blame or punish victims instead of addressing the bullies.
Make

Dialogue

Interviewer
what will you do if you find a student being bullied
Interviewee
punish the bullied student
Interviewer
you're hired

Text content

*educational institutions

Overview

A three-panel comic from Cyanide and Happiness satirizing educational institutions' handling of bullying. The first panel shows an interviewer asking, 'what will you do if you find a student being bullied'. The second panel features the interviewee responding, 'punish the bullied student', followed by the interviewer declaring 'you're hired' in the third panel. The bottom of the third panel is labeled '*educational institutions', implying that some institutions unjustly blame or punish victims instead of addressing the bullies.

Origin notes

The image is a webcomic from the series 'Cyanide and Happiness' by Explosm.net, as indicated by the watermark 'Cyanide and Happiness © Explosm.net' at the bottom. It was shared on Reddit under the 'Meme' category with the original title 'True story btw'.

Similar memes

This is a remixed stick figure meme parodying the popular 'are ya winning son' template. A stick figure father wearing a hat, smoking a cigarette and holding a mug stands in a doorway asking 'ARE YA hired SON??'. The second stick figure, representing a job seeker, lies on the floor crying, surrounded by scattered job application documents, next to an open laptop marked with the LinkedIn logo, and replies 'NO.'. The meme humorously depicts the common frustration of unsuccessful job hunting after submitting large numbers of applications via professional platforms like LinkedIn.

Are Ya Hired Son Job Search Relatable Meme

This is a remixed stick figur…

This meme depicts a frustrating, absurd job interview scenario. The top section features a three-line dialogue that exposes a contradictory hiring double standard: 1. Interviewer: "Forget everything you learned in college, you won't need it working here" 2. Applicant: "But I didn't go to college?" 3. Interviewer: "Well, then you're unqualified for this job" Below the text is a stock photo of an older bald interviewer (wearing a purple shirt and tie, gesturing with his right hand, displaying a serious, dismissive expression) and a younger male applicant (in a maroon shirt and tie, leaning forward with a confused, frustrated look) sitting at a desk. The desk holds a laptop, papers, a pen, and a glass cup filled with pencils, while a round wall clock is visible in the background. The humor stems from the catch-22 situation: the company dismisses college education as irrelevant, yet requires it as a mandatory qualification, putting the applicant in an impossible no-win position. It satirizes the arbitrary, contradictory hiring requirements many job seekers face in modern workplaces.

Catch-22 Job Interview Meme: College Degree Double Standard

This meme depicts a frustrati…

A four-panel meme arranged in a 2x2 grid. The top-left panel contains the text 'TEACHERS WHEN A BULLY HITS A STUDENT'. The top-right panel shows a man with a wide smile, wearing sunglasses and a suit, against a blue background. The bottom-left panel contains the text 'TEACHERS WHEN THE STUDENT HITS THE BULLY BACK'. The bottom-right panel shows the same man with a frowning, displeased expression. The meme humorously critiques the perceived double standard in teachers' reactions to bullying versus a student defending themselves.

Teachers' Contradictory Reactions to Bullying

A four-panel meme arranged in…

This is a 4-panel Cyanide and Happiness webcomic that uses a double meaning for a dark satirical joke about student debt. The first panel shows a clickbait online ad that reads "CLICK HERE TO WATCH COLLEGE TEENS GET FUCKED HARD", which audiences will initially assume is a pornographic advertisement. The second panel shows a man smiling and clicking the ad at his desk. The third panel reveals the literal, unexpected punchline: the content is an approval for a 7.08% interest student loan for a college student, meaning the teen is actually being screwed (fucked) over by high-interest debt, fulfilling the clickbait headline in a completely different way. The fourth panel shows the man still smiling at his monitor after clicking.

College Teens Get Fucked Hard Student Loan Joke

This is a 4-panel Cyanide and…

This is a 4-panel remix of the popular Expanding Brain meme template, focused on workplace termination phrases: 1. **Panel 1**: Straightforward phrase "You're fired" paired with a basic skull-and-brain outline 2. **Panel 2**: Formal corporate phrasing "Your employment is hereby terminated" paired with a glowing, complex digital brain graphic 3. **Panel 3**: Absurd internet slang "You're jobn't" (portmanteau of 'job' and 'ain't') paired with a cosmic, exploding brain visual 4. **Panel 4**: Sarcastic twist "You're promoted to customer" paired with a god-like, glowing blue humanoid figure The meme humorously exaggerates the evolution of firing language from direct to absurdly creative/sarcastic, using the Expanding Brain format to frame each step as a more 'enlightened' or extreme take on the same core message.

Escalating Firing Phrases Expanding Brain Meme

This is a 4-panel remix of th…

A two-panel meme. Top panel: Two buttons labeled 'Defend a bloodthirsty dictator' and 'Defend a pedophile' with a hand pointing to the latter. Bottom panel: A distressed, sweating man having his forehead wiped by another hand, with the caption 'AMERICANS IN REDDIT'. The meme satirizes the perception that Americans on Reddit are quick to engage in defending controversial figures like pedophiles over dictators.

Americans in Reddit Button Meme

A two-panel meme. Top panel: …

A four-panel comic strip with an orange background featuring an elderly woman with white hair and glasses talking to a younger person with glasses. The first panel shows the elderly woman asking "Whats Wrong?" In the second panel, the younger person looks sad with tears and responds "I get bullied at work..." The third panel shows the elderly woman looking confused and saying "But you work from home." The fourth panel reveals the younger person looking sad next to a small gray cat, implying the cat is the workplace bully despite working from home.

Work From Home Bullying

A four-panel comic strip with…

This is a two-panel comparison meme using the widely recognized Buff Doge vs. Crying Cheems template to comment on grade inflation. The left panel, labeled '3.9 GPA BEFORE', features a muscular, confident Buff Doge paired with the text 'I can get a job anywhere, or go to any college or grad school where I want to!', representing how a 3.9 GPA was previously a rare, highly valuable credential that opened significant academic and professional opportunities. The right panel, labeled '3.9 GPA TODAY', features a small, crying, dejected Cheems Shiba Inu paired with the text 'I applied for 1,000 jobs — and I got rejected by all of them.', illustrating that grade inflation has made a 3.9 GPA far more common, so it no longer guarantees success in job or higher education applications.

Grade Inflation in a Nutshell

This is a two-panel compariso…

A three-panel meme depicting a common school scenario. The top panel shows a school administrator looking appalled while reading from a paper, labeled 'School Admin'. The middle panel shows a person with a blue face mask labeled 'School Bully'. The bottom panel shows a serious-looking individual labeled 'Quiet kid who was forced to defend himself'. The meme highlights the injustice where school administrators often blame the victim who defends themselves against bullying.

School Admin, Bully, and Quiet Kid

A three-panel meme depicting …

A four-panel comic meme. Panel 1: A blue-skinned, angry character with pointed ears and a menacing grin says, 'I TRIED TO KILL A BABY.' Panel 2: Darth Vader, the iconic black-armored Sith Lord from Star Wars, with a stern expression, declares, 'I DESTROYED WHOLE PLANETS!!' Panel 3: A cheerful man in a car, smiling and pointing upwards with his index finger, states, 'I created LinkedIn.' Panel 4: A red devil with horns, a goatee, and bat-like wings hands a golden trophy to the LinkedIn creator against a fiery, hellish background. The humor lies in the escalating absurdity: the devil rewarding the LinkedIn creator implies that founding LinkedIn is considered a more 'evil' act than the villainous deeds of the first two characters.

Creating LinkedIn is Worse Than Being a Sith Lord

A four-panel comic meme. Pane…

The meme features a text exchange depicting a frustrating job interview interaction at the top: the interviewer rejects the candidate for lacking job experience, and when the candidate asks how to obtain that experience, the interviewer replies they need to get a job first. Below the text is a still from the 2022 Pixar animated film *Turning Red*: the partially visible left character is labeled *Interviewer*, while the right character, labeled *Me*, has a wide-eyed, shocked, exasperated expression of disbelief. The joke satirizes the common, illogical catch-22 of modern entry-level job markets, where employers demand prior work experience even for roles targeted at first-time job seekers, trapping candidates in an impossible cycle.

Job market in one image

The meme features a text exch…