The “Phoebe teaching Joey” meme, which features a short French lesson in Friendsis a social media classic, used to capture the moment when an attempt at teaching backfires. Where does this scene that makes us laugh so much come from?
The “Phoebe teaching Joey” meme is probably better known in France in the form of Phoebe giving Joey a French lesson.
It comes from a passage in the series Friendsand ended up becoming a reference – like the series, in short – to illustrate the complete failure of an explanation. It is also used to illustrate the contrast between a person who perfectly understands a concept or notion and another who seems completely off the mark.
The “Phoebe teaching Joey” meme consists of two images taken from a scene from the series Friendswhich celebrates its 30th anniversary in 2024. The scene depicts Phoebe Buffay, step by step uttering a phrase or concept to explain it to Joey Tribbiani, followed by the same Joey desperately trying to repeat what he hears… failing miserably.
But what is the origin of this meme, and how did it become so popular?
When Joey (really) doesn’t understand anything…
The “Phoebe teaching Joey” meme comes from the episode titled The One Where Joey Speaks French (Season 10, Episode 13) of the series Friends. In French, the episode was titled The one who jabbered.
In this episode, Joey has to learn French for an audition, and Phoebe offers to help him. Although she is patient and tries to get him to repeat simple sentences, Joey turns every word into incomprehensible gibberish, creating one of the most hilarious scenes in the series.
On December 5, 2011, an unregistered 9GAG user uploaded an eight-panel image based on the scene. Since then, the meme has mainly been used to illustrate situations in which a person or a group of people will do the exact opposite of what common sense or common mortals would dictate.
We will have seen this in particular in the case of the covid-19 pandemic where the directive “stay at home” during confinement becomes “picnic in the park” for Joey.
Create your own Phoebe teaching Joey meme
With the popularity of this meme, it’s easy to find generators online that allow you to create your own version of “Phoebe teaching Joey.” The ImgFlip platform is a good basis for creating your own version of the Phoebe teaching Joey meme.
Source: www.numerama.com
