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The Women’s Humor project has a massive presence on social media. On Twitter alone, it’s amassed a whopping 1 million followers. Meanwhile, it has another million fans over on Facebook, as well as a further 186k followers on Instagram.
The project has been running on Twitter all the way since August 2011. It’s worth repeating once again that most of the memes shared here are something that basically anyone will be able to vibe with because they’re so universal. However, the project states that it’s specifically focusing on the type of content that only women might enjoy.
Comedy expert Ariane, from the UK, shared her thoughts with Bored Panda on how to give a meme more staying power and help it attract more attention, aside from making it more relatable.
"Make sure your meme is original. People are less likely to share or like content they’ve already seen or which is similar," she told us.
"Ensure it’s topical for added impact. And, of course, make it as funny as possible. That way, people will be more willing to share it to make their friends and followers laugh."
Meanwhile, the comedy writer gave some tips on what content creators should remember to keep their content fresh and relatable.
"I used to read the news to come up with ideas. There are of course fresh stories every day, so reading them is a good way of dreaming up new content," she suggested. "Failing that, I took inspiration from everyday life and the situations I found myself in."
Ariane also shed some light on what determines what we laugh at and whether it's at all related to our gender. "I think it depends. As a female comedian, I found that some of the female audience would be turned off by anything crude, sweary, or gross out, whereas this was definitely less the case for men," she told Bored Panda.
"But of course, that isn’t the case for all women—I love crude and sweary humor!"
A lot of the memes shared by Women’s Humor focus on work issues, money problems, eating and partying way too much, being totally exhausted all the time, and chilling when things get far, far too stressful. These are all things that most adults can relate to if we’re being very honest.
It’s the kind of stuff that many folks will find themselves complaining about to their pals and coworkers, though it might not always be in meme format. And it has a lot to do with chronic stress, a lack of self-care, and burnout at work. Unfortunately, burnout is a very common theme in many workplaces.
A recent marketplace survey conducted by Deloitte found that the ‘always on’ work culture has led to a lot of stress and burnout. 77% of respondents admitted that they’ve experienced burnout at their current place of work. Meanwhile, more than half also revealed that this has happened multiple times. And the repercussions are very far-reaching.
91% of respondents noted that all of this stress has a negative impact on their work while 83% said that it also affects their personal relationships. There’s also a deep dissonance at play here: 87% of working professionals said that they’re passionate about their jobs, but 64% admitted that they’re frequently stressed. In other words, just because someone’s passionate about their job doesn’t make them immune to stress or burnout—something that many of you Pandas reading this may know from experience.
The Deloitte survey also found that companies may not be very effective at ‘solving’ burnout as an issue. Around 70% of respondents felt that their employers weren’t doing enough to prevent burnout, and 21% said that their places of work did absolutely nothing to help prevent it. It’s not just well-being programs that businesses ought to consider. It’s the work culture itself that they need to invest in, too. For one, supportive leaders who recognize their employees’ achievements can do a lot to help mitigate workplace stress.
It’s not like a worker’s going to stick around in a toxic, high-stress environment forever. There comes a point in time when everybody, no matter how tough, reaches their limit. A company’s top talents might decide that the high salary might no longer be worth their sleepless nights, horrific overtime, and constant tension. According to Deloitte, half of the millennials who participated in their survey said they left a job because of burnout. And we all know how expensive and time-consuming it is to replace and train new employees.
Though the employer should do everything in their power to create an environment where the chances of burnout are slim, the reality is that workers will always face some level of stress at the office. That’s the nature of having a job! Tight deadlines, unexpected issues, new responsibilities, and having to work a bit of overtime—these are all things that can add to someone’s stress levels.
