What Does This Mean?
A GIF of Giant Bomb video producer Drew Scanlon rapidly blinking in disbelief, used to express confusion, skepticism, or a slow-dawning realization in reaction to something absurd.
EXPLAINER
The Daily Dot · original source ↗
EXPLAINER
ABC7 News Bay Area · original source ↗
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REAL-WORLD EXAMPLE
"He explained the plan again and all I could do was Blinking White Guy at him."
LORE & ORIGIN
The GIF is a real reaction from Drew Scanlon, a video producer at gaming site Giant Bomb, captured in 2013 while he was reacting to a colleague's off-the-cuff joke during a livestream. The clip sat mostly unnoticed until 2015, when a NeoGAF forum user named Tokubetsu posted the GIF to the video game discussion forum.
The GIF stayed niche for roughly two more years before breaking out in winter 2017, when Twitter user @eskbl used it on February 5 to describe their reaction to a biology class; that tweet drew over 60,000 retweets and 100,000 likes and turned the clip into a full-blown mainstream meme. It went on to be ranked Giphy's #2 GIF of 2017, and Scanlon has since used his meme recognition to raise money for multiple sclerosis research.
MENTIONS OVER TIME
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