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When it comes to turning something terrifying into something hilarious, the internet is truly undefeated. And its newest meme obsession—turning the images of gun-toting right-wing counter-protesters Mark and Patricia McCloskey into something hilariously absurd—is truly one of the all-time greats.
In case you missed it, the McCloskeys are the St. Louis lawyers who pointed a handgun and an assault rifle at peaceful protesters on Sunday. The McCloskeys explained their show of force by claiming that they feared a "Storming of the Bastille"-type threat from the protest, which passed their house en route to St. Louis Mayor Lyda Krewson's home.
Images and videos of the couple pointing weapons at the protesters ricocheted around social media all day Sunday as people expressed their horror.
But in the days since, that horror has shifted to mockery, as internet folk have been churning out meme after meme of the McCloskeys—and the comedy is absolute fire.
Iconic drag queen Divine made an appearance—fitting, given that during more normal times, Sunday would have been the day of LGBTQ Pride parades in many cities.
Others took perennially popular memes and rememed them to include the McCloskeys.
Very meta!
https://t.co/K5rFMIIlGZ— Cody Johnston (@Cody Johnston) 1593399520.0
And there have been several McCloskey-starring classic movie reboots—all zero-star flops, surely!
scarface remake sucks https://t.co/K4ry3SXdDA— beth (@beth) 1593402069.0
This Mr. & Mrs. Smith sequel looks terrible https://t.co/bMICfpmLX0— Jess Dweck (@Jess Dweck) 1593398820.0
And, perhaps unsurprisingly, the most popular format seems to be casting Mrs. McCloskey as not just a "Karen," but the Queen of Karens, the Karen to end all Karens, the Karen all the other Karens have to fight on the last level of the metaphorical Karen video game.
They'd like to speak to the manager ... of DEATH. pic.twitter.com/1UUUW4bZAm
— Daniel Kibblesmith (@kibblesmith) June 29, 2020
But perhaps the best memes were the ones that just pointed out the absurd, blink-and-you-miss them details.
Protecting my home by barefootedly shooting my tiny husband in the head with a .22 https://t.co/DixdI7w2HJ— ThirstingToDefundTheMIC (@ThirstingToDefundTheMIC) 1593397130.0
St Louis Gun Karen out here lookin like the Hamburglar https://t.co/O6a1tc6M4e— Respected Scientist (@Respected Scientist) 1593399078.0
This woman has mustard on her shirt https://t.co/og1gXCids2— Carey O'Donnell (@Carey O'Donnell) 1593404413.0
Absolutely stellar work, internet folk.
Memes just might be the thing that gets us through 2020.