LADOTC


On the recent rise in popularity of Soyjak culture in mainstream media


Recently, I've been seeing people in mainstream social media, or media in general, use terms and ideas from Soyjak culture, without actually understanding any of their meanings or where they came from.
The following is a list of things and terms that come from Soyjak or adjacent culture that I have seen used in mainstream media.
These things all originate from either the Soyjak Party itself or it's adjacent communites.
Now I will go over all these terms explaining their origin and real meanings, before explaining why I believe they are being appropriated by mainsteam social media.

Soyjak

This, along with Chud, are probably the most used and misunderstood term of the ones I will talk about in this short text.
Unfortunately though, most people completely misunderstand the idea of Soyjak and what it is supposed to represent.
They can be described as a sort of art form meant to make fun of targeted certain groups of people.
First of all, I must go over where they come from:
The first time that so called "Nu-Males", a type of terminally online modern man that is characterized by a lack of strong masculine physical features and their beard-and-glasses fashion, also known as a "Soy Boy", started being defined and made fun of was around 2015 in mostly far-right internet communities. This classification of a type of male was the sort of base from which Soyjaks originated from.
The first ever Soyjak was then posted on December 30, 2017 on 4chans /int/ board.
From there they started spreading across other 4chan boards, most notably, /qa/.
On /qa/ they became very popular, which formed a sort of community around these drawings of silly bald men with glasses.
After some censorship and the overall rivalry between the now formed Soyjak culture and the rest of 4chan, someone named Soot created an imageboard dedicated to Soyjaks alone on September 19, 2020. This was received very well by /qa/ and most jakkers moved to that imageboard instead of 4chans /qa/.
It should also be mentioned that 4chans /tv/ was also very involved in the forming of Soyjak culture.

On November 3, 2021, Soyjak culture was effectively banned from /qa/, which then led to the full locking of the board.
This event is often refered to as "The Great Soyset", "Operation Clean Stable" or "The November 3rd Massacre", it was possibly one of the most eventful days in Soyjak history.
Many originally believed this was due to a recent raid started by /qa/ on 4chans /lgbt/, but most now know it was planned long before that.
From then on forward, all Soyjak culture lived on the imageboard created earlier in 2020 by Soot, known as Soyjak Party.
I will not go into the full history of the Soyjak Party as you can just read the Happenings pages on their Wiki.

Gem & Coal

These terms, along with other ones that I will not mention to not make them more popular in mainstream media, are a part of a "Mineral Rating System" also originating from 4chans far-right boards and later, the Soyjak Party.
The first rating to emerge was "Gem", it has been used on 4chan to refer to high-quality posts since at least 2011 (according to the Soyjak Wiki).
On July-August 2020, "Gem" was then popularized on 4chans /int/.
The original thread by Soot advertising the Soyjak Party on /qa/ was also "bumped" and refered to as a "Gem" by the residents of /qa/. From there on "Gem" became the standard way to describe a high-quality Soyjak.

It is somewhat disputed where "Coal" actually comes from, with most believing it originates from either the very early Soyjak Party or /qa/ itself.
The first verifyable use of "Coal" was in October 2020.
"Coal" then acquired it's standard meaning as an antonym to "Gem" throughout 2021.

As mentioned before, there are other ratings such as "Iron", "Brimstone", "Dust" and many more.
It is not as known where these come from, except from that they were first used on the Soyjak Party.

Chud

The origin of "Chud" is disputed.
The first technical "Chudjak" was posted on the German imageboard Kohlchan to make fun of raiding 4chan /pol/ users, it was a front-facing drawing traced from Patrick Crusius, then being called "Le /pol/ face".
A later "Wojakified" version of the "Chudjak" was then created on the leftist imageboard Bunkerchan, now known as Leftypol, much later as a way to make fun of incels and general right-wing 4chan and Soyjak Party users.
The term "Chud" was also first used on Bunkerchan.
Eventually "Chud" and "Chudjak" were integrated into Soyjak Culture as a sort of "self-insert" by the users of the Soyjak Party and connected communities, the Soyjak Wiki compares this reclaimation to the N-Word being used by Black people despite it originally being meant as a slur against them.
Despite popular offsite (offsite refering to people on non-Soyjak websites) belief, Chudjak is not a Soyjak, as it lacks the common and necessary features of Soyjaks and is not used anymore to make fun of people, what these features are can be read on the Soyjak Wiki.
"Chud" is altough by many considered an "honorary Soyjak".
Additionally, the idea that "Chud" simply refers to the acronym, "Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dweller", makes many "offsiters" believe "Chud" simply refers "losers" in general while being very unaware of it's origins and actual meaning.

The case of "Nothing ever happens" & "Billions must x"
Many people also associate these phrases to the Chud or Chudjak, but both of these actually did not develop from the Soyjak Party or 4chan, but instead alt-right twitter users around 2022.

Why?

Now that I have explained the real meanings of these terms and ideas, let's think about why these have been gaining so much popularity in media that they were never meant be used in.
Most people know that recently far-right and alt-right ideas have been getting more popular and that the "acceptable" window of political ideas is being widened.
This leads to some people of the Soyjak Community being allowed to post on other platforms.
This is perhaps the most popular theory, but I don't think this is what is actually making them popular.
I believe that there are certain spikes of appropriation waves of the Soyjak culture in mainstream media due to singular posts or videos "blowing up" on the respective platforms.
The Chud is a good example of this, the, I think, first wave of appropriation happened around late 2022 in right-wing twitter, when, as mentioned earlier, the "billions must x" phrase was being used. Around this time many Twitter users also started posting non-political Soyjaks and calling them "incomprehensible wojacks". The "ChudBob SoyPants" video by twitter user "Hyperjumper", although released later on May 14th 2023, is also a part of this.
The then misunderstanding of the word Chud first came from a Twitter post that went something like "look at my chud son". (to anyone that knows about the original post and what was actually said in it, please contact me)
This same misunderstanding is now gaining even more popularity on sites such as TikTok. The current wave comes I believe from a specific clip of a Twitch streamer laughing at a "67 meme" and calling himself a "fat fucking chud". Additionally, a "song" made by TikTok user "the_weststation" that is about someone describing themselves as a Chud, obviously not knowing the actual meaning of Chud", is also contributing to this wave of popularity.

Most of my information came from my own knowledge and the Soyjak Wiki.