The Origin of the "Since You Got Your Degree" Phrase You've Seen on Social Media Is Pretty Dark
Published June 26 2023, 4:32 p.m. ET
To explain the power of TikTok, one would need to write an entire dissertation.
TikTok trends have no definitive hashtag, URL, or domain name; they just exist. Thanks to the online community, the world has bore witness to some of the most hilarious inside jokes known to man — so much so that sometimes, it’s hard to keep up!
The “Since you got your degree and you know every f****** thing,” sound is only one of the audio bits to take over TikTok as of late. The problem? You have no idea what it means. Here’s some context …
The dark backstory behind the “since you got your degree” sound that’s going viral on social media.
We hate to break it to you, but the truth is, one of the internet’s favorite inside jokes was actually ripped from a pretty disturbing scene in Tyler Perry’s Precious.
Based on the book Push, authored by the critically acclaimed author and poet, Sapphire, Gabrielle Sidibe (Empire) stars as the title character. Throughout the film, viewers see Precious grapple with being a downtrodden teen mom of two children who were fathered by her own dad.
Mo’Nique (The Parkers) stars as her mother, Mary. She admits to Precious’ social worker, Mrs. Weiss (Mariah Carey), that she knew that Precious had been abused over the years. In fact, she was an accomplice to her abuse.
When opening up about her experience, Monique accuses Mrs. Weiss of being condescending. “Hmm? Since you got your degree and you know every f------ thing,” Monique said to the social worker in the movie.
While the scene was far from funny, somehow, social media has made the audio snippet a staple of social media hilarity. The audio started going viral in March 2022, when user @auntienae posted a clip from the movie on TikTok.
She captioned the video: “When I go to my brutally honest friend for advice but they’re too brutally honest and hurt my feelings.”
Not long after, others hopped on the trend and even more comedy ensued.
“When your RN sister tells you ‘No one's ever died of a heart attack,’” user @foreverroshay captioned a TikTok.
Plus, not only did someone have this dessert company — @bentoboxbakes — and plenty of others write the phrase on a cake, a few folks used the audio as inspiration for their grad caps.
Isn’t it funny how funny it is to make unfunny things hilarious?
