Despite the fact that the Crying Jordan meme has basically become a staple of the Internet's existence at this point, there are still people out there who don't know how the meme works or who "Crying Jordan" even is. We saw evidence of that on Monday morning, thanks to Ja Rule, and we saw it again on Monday night, thanks to Reddit user AmazingRealist who asked his fellow Reddit users to help him identify "that crying black dude that gets linked every time a team gets eliminated" in a hockey subreddit.
Here's the original post that eventually shot AmazingRealist to the front page of the hockey subreddit. Try to envision it without the edits, which were added by AmazingRealist to explain why he asked the question in the first place:
Here's also a very small sample of the helpful—er, "helpful"?—feedback he got from his fellow Redditors who responded to his question:
And finally, here's a response from a Redditor who cut right to the chase and told AmazingRealist exactly who "Crying Jordan" is:
We're actually going to defend this Reddit user for a moment because, as he mentioned in one of his edits, he's Swedish, so he's kind of got a built-in excuse for not knowing MJ. He probably didn't grow up worshipping at the altar of MJ like many of us did, and he's clearly into hockey more than basketball, so why would he know MJ? (and don't say, "Everyone knows MJ!" because clearly, they don't)
Besides, this kind of ignorance isn't new. There are little kids out there who think John Madden is a video game character more comparable to Donkey Kong than, say, Vince Lombardi. Each successive generation is, unfortunately, going to know less and less about MJ. He went from Bull to baseball player back to Bull to retired to Wizard to retired to shoe magnate to NBA owner to meme to, apparently, "that crying black dude." It happens.
With all of that said, we can forgive a guy who is probably young and doesn't care about the NBA for being incredibly confused. But before you ask about "that crying black dude," we'd suggest check out this guide. If nothing else, it'll keep you off the front pages of Reddit.
