If everyone made use of the post language feature, it would entirely solve this problem. Unfortunately (at least to my knowledge) it's not possible to set a default post language, so most content is just posted as Undetermined.
this post was submitted on 11 May 2025
393 points (92.8% liked)
memes
15548 readers
3366 users here now
Community rules
1. Be civil
No trolling, bigotry or other insulting / annoying behaviour
2. No politics
This is non-politics community. For political memes please go to !politicalmemes@lemmy.world
3. No recent reposts
Check for reposts when posting a meme, you can only repost after 1 month
4. No bots
No bots without the express approval of the mods or the admins
5. No Spam/Ads
No advertisements or spam. This is an instance rule and the only way to live.
A collection of some classic Lemmy memes for your enjoyment
Sister communities
- !tenforward@lemmy.world : Star Trek memes, chat and shitposts
- !lemmyshitpost@lemmy.world : Lemmy Shitposts, anything and everything goes.
- !linuxmemes@lemmy.world : Linux themed memes
- !comicstrips@lemmy.world : for those who love comic stories.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
Its no problem, just learn German by translating the memes.
I do, admittedly, find it fun to try and work out the meaning through context despite not being able to read German.
If you can read English, you can read (most of) German. The problem is likely more in understanding it.
Listen here, you little shit.
Where are the Listen?
I am highly curious about the context of this particular one.
In many German Reddit meme communities, there’s a ban on using English enforced by the community through an all caps ouiji style comment chain, telling the offender “sprich deutsch, du hurensohn,” which means “speak German, you bastard [literally:son of a whore].” ~~In response to~~ (edit: Probably separately from but working well with) that, people began trying to avoid the use of germanized English words and wound up creating basically a pidgin in which things that don’t literally translate are translated literally, completely muddling things for English speakers learning German. My favorite example is a company that used to be run by bill gates, winzigweich, which makes kraftpunkt, Mannschaften, und überbiete, in addition to Fenster.
Edit: the pidgin is called Zangendeutsch (tongs German)
Who is this "Bill Gates"? Do you mean Gesetzesentwurf Bogen?
Ah fuck
Side note: the translation you chose for bill was not one of the two I was thinking of (Schein as in currency and Rechnung), which reminded me of when my student asked why there were two words for receipt and I listed off five and just had to apologize
Scheintore klingt gut.
My memory isn't what it was and it's been at least 100 years, back when Krautchan was ~~good~~ existent, but I do think Zangendeutsch came before we started enforcing it by declaring offenders Hurensöhne. If there are/were ever people who seriously wanted to ban English (and allow only German exclusively), they were a tiny minority and the point of Zangendeutsch went right over their head.
One could even see it as a parody of people who really want to ban any non-German influence on the German language. Zangendeutsch shows how ridiculous it would be to vanish all words of a language that haven't been part of that language for more than –let's say– a hundred years.
Tbh I just find the "Translations" really funny. Sometimes I also use them in real life as well
load more comments
(2 replies)
Was er ☝️ sagt.
To be fair, it’s a common source of comedy for speakers of any language with a lot of loan words to treat them like calques for the purpose of momentary confusion. People refer to little mules or little asses when discussing Mexican food in English, for example. I also didn’t even start learning German until 2009, so I definitely wasn’t there when it started.
Nothing could be further from me than claiming we're being very original. Only 1 Pimmel would do that. I just thought your Pfosten might make people think there may be OTHER, very uniquely German reasons for this nonsense. Ü
I mean, Zangendeutsch really takes it to another level with the absolute commitment though
It certainly is no laughing matter.
What do you expect? It's ~~German stuff~~ stuff some weird selfish 2000s internet nerd basement kids invented. And I think it's beautiful.
load more comments
(6 replies)
Ah yes, learn Zangendeutsch for make benefit homeland
I like having random german posts in my feed
it would entirely solve this problem
Welches Problem?
Das Guten Tag, Anschluss "Problem".
load more comments
(5 replies)
This is what my German teacher meant when he said that I'd "need it someday".
Supertoll. Danke schön. Ich hätte auch gerne ein Pedalo.
load more comments
(1 replies)
Oh hey I understand that! It says "Speak German to Spez".
I asked ChatGPT to translate a meme and now GPT talks to me like:
Men hvorfor i all videste verden holde seg til tysk når kontinentet har så mange andre språk også? Det er like mye kveld her nordpå som der nede, om noen ikke kan samtlige språk er det vel det britene kaller "skill issue".
Ik spreek ook een beetje Nederlands en italiaans, maar het is grappig om spreken Zangendeutsch. Wij zijn rare mensen. Taalse zijn leuk.
Sometimes I can still understand them somehow...
Aquí faltan memes en español. Si queremos confundirles debemos usar más idiomas.
view more: next ›