The absurdist humor of the original clip also played a key role in its viral spread, as people sought to one-up each other with increasingly bizarre and surreal variations on the theme. Gen Alpha, the generation after Gen Z, is already coming up with creative memes and social media slang terms. New slang like “fanum tax” is going viral and leaking into conversations outside of TikTok, confusing parents and even older siblings.
What Does ‘Fanum Tax’ Mean? The TikTok Slang Term That Started With A Twitch Streamer Explained
- Earlier this week, the TikToker Anthony Mai shared he was confused about what “Fanum tax” is — and, more importantly, if he and others are starting “to lose touch” with online cultural relevancy.
- A “Fanum tax” is a different way to say “food tax.” A “food tax” is when one person takes a “tax” from their friend’s food or meal, as in, they take a bite from their friend’s food.
- In a world where content is constantly vying for attention, streamers and their fans often rely on inside jokes, memes, and other forms of absurdist humor to stand out and build a sense of shared identity.
- “I’m 17 next month, i know what fanum tax is but i had to be told it, is this what old people experienced,” one commenter asked.
- Fanum tax comes from the comedy creator Fanum, who is a member of streamer Kai Cenat’s influencer crew AMP.
While the “fanum tax” may seem like a simple inside joke, it actually reveals a great deal about the culture and dynamics of the streaming world. At its core, the meme is a reflection of the intimate, parasocial relationships that can develop between streamers and their fans. By establishing an ongoing joke and encouraging fans to participate, Fanum and other streamers create a sense of shared experience and community that keeps viewers coming back for more. Ultimately, the “fanum tax” meme is a testament to the incredible power and potential of online communities to create shared meaning and value through participatory culture. As the streaming industry continues to evolve and grow, it will be fascinating to see how streamers and their fans continue to push the boundaries of what is possible, and to create new forms of content and community that challenge and inspire us all. But the “fanum tax” is just one example of the many ways in which streamers and their fans are co-creating meaning and value through shared experiences and inside jokes.
In a video about the song that’s been viewed over 3.7 million times, a 23-year-old woman said she understood everything up until “Skibidi” and “Fanum tax.” Numerous younger Gen Zers hopped into the comments to say they, too, had no context clues for the viral lyrics. While most listeners seem vaguely aware of what “Skibidi toilet” is, since the meme about the animated talking toilet has been popular online for a few months, “Fanum tax” is newly perplexing. At the outset of 2023, “Fanum tax” would continue to be used among the AMP streamers, most prominently involving Fanum stealing bits of Kai Cenat’s food during streams. Finally, on June 24th, 2023, Cenat’s own YouTube posted a compilation of every time Fanum collected his tax up to that point. The clip that started it all features Kai Cenat and Fanum sitting together, with Kai eating a plate of french fries. Fanum Tax is a Gen-Z slang term that refers to a running gag in which Twitch streamer Fanum “taxes” members of his YouTube group AMP (primarily Kai Cenat) who happen to how to read crypto prices be eating by swiping some of their food.
From there, the TikTok sound of the tune blew up, appearing in over 20k videos in four days. The compilation drove home the fact that no matter the food, no matter the stream, Fanum would be there to claim his tax, like a Twitch-ier, hungrier IRS. Luckily, it’s not that confusing; you just need to know all the references and how to add element to c++ array slang. On August 19th, 2023, TikToker6 @zacharylovesanime also parodied a cringe kid saying “Fanum tax” in a video that received roughly 869,600 plays and 87,200 likes in two months (shown below, right).
What is the Origin of the Fanum Tax?
In other words, if they’re eating on the AMP stream, Fanum must collect a tax on their meal. These numbers demonstrate the incredible reach and engagement of the “fanum tax” meme, and highlight the power of social media to amplify and spread cultural phenomena. Fanum, whom the term “Fanum tax” references, is a Twitch streamer who’s a part of the collective AMP which consists of fellow viral streamers like Kai Cenat and Duke Dennis. As stated, Fanum is the one the “tax” is named after because he started to tax his friends live on stream, busting down the door of their rooms to take an aggressive bite of food.
Fanum Tax
In the weeks and months following the original clip, the “fanum tax” meme took on a life of its own, spreading across TikTok, Twitter, and other platforms. Fans of Fanum and Kai Cenat began creating their own riffs on the joke, filming themselves “paying” the tax with various foods or even non-edible objects. Other streamers and content creators got in on the trend as well, with some even establishing their own “tax rates” for fans and fellow streamers. The rapid spread of the “fanum tax” meme is a testament to the power of inside jokes and shared references within online communities. For fans of Fanum, Kai Cenat, and the broader streaming world, the meme served as a way to signal their insider status and connect with others who were in on the joke.
“You don’t have to get every joke on the internet. Not finding this funny, does not make you better than gen A.” “I’m 17 next month, i know what fanum tax is but i had to be told it, is this what old people experienced,” one commenter asked. Earlier this week, the TikToker Anthony Mai shared he was confused about what “Fanum tax” is — and, more importantly, if he and others are starting “to lose touch” with online cultural relevancy. The Phantom Tax meme is a humorous concept that refers to the hypothetical scenario where a person is audited by the tax authorities and how to buy metis finds out that they owe a staggering amount of money in taxes, only to realize that it’s not actually owed to the government. The meme is often accompanied by a series of ridiculous and absurd explanations for why the person is being taxed for something they didn’t actually earn.
In addition to being confused, some TikTokers have created parody videos using “Fanum tax” as an example of how bizarre they feel Gen Alpha slang has become. One popular clip imagines that all the little kids on Roblox voice-chat sing the meme song. A skit influencer made a video pretending to be an annoying kid who overuses terminally online slang. The song was originally posted on October 4 by the user @papaboy020 and featured a character dancing in Roblox.