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The "Rent Is Too Damn High" meme features an image based on Jimmy McMillan, a political figure from New York City, known for his prolific slogan during the November 2010 gubernatorial election in New York. The image often showcases McMillan in his distinct debate attire, usually captured raising his fist in a powerful gesture. This image serves as the foundation for an Advice Animal-style image macro series used widely across the internet. The snowclone template derived from this meme, "The X is too damn high," allows users to substitute 'X' with whatever they find exorbitantly high or excessive, applying McMillan's signature expression to a variety of contexts.
Jimmy McMillan coined the phrase "The Rent Is Too Damn High" while representing the party of the same name during the New York Gubernatorial debate on October 18th, 2010. His repetitive use of the slogan throughout the debate caught significant attention. The debating footage was shared by The Daily Beast on YouTube, quickly becoming a viral sensation. This moment captured in a screengrab, featuring McMillan's emphatic fist raise, inspired the creation of an Advice Animal image macro that saw widespread adoption on platforms like Quickmeme. The initial meme started circulating more broadly after its inclusion in a Reddit post on the r/gaming subreddit on August 6th, 2011, illustrating user frustration with the caption "The mouse sensitivity / is too damn high!"
Origin: 2010
AI Memes is a free online meme maker that lets you create viral memes with custom text, images, and AI-powered editing tools.
You can browse our growing library of popular meme templates, quickly caption images, videos, or GIFs in Caption This, or design completely custom image memes from scratch in our free-form editor with extra AI tools like Magic Prompt, Magic Face Swap, Magic Erase, and Magic Face.
The platform includes three main tools:
Text is fully customizable with font selection, weight controls, colors, and styling like outlines and italics. Each text layer has its own opacity slider, and you can drag text around the canvas or drag layers in the sidebar to control which elements appear on top. Add as many text boxes as you need with the "Add Text" button.
Upload and layer additional images onto your meme with the "Upload Image" button. Each image can be repositioned, resized, and have its opacity adjusted. Paste images directly with CMD/CTRL + V for quick edits.
Enable custom headers above your media with adjustable colors and heights—perfect for adding context or reaction text. This works in both Caption This and when editing templates from the meme library.
Yes! Use Caption This to add text, headers, and captions to videos and animated GIFs. Simply upload your video or GIF file, add your customizations, and download the finished meme. The tool preserves the animation and exports your captioned video or animated GIF ready to share.
You can also upload your own videos and animated GIFs in Caption This to add captions and text overlays. The meme template library features hundreds of popular image templates that open in the same editor with all the same customization options.
All our tools work well on mobile! Whether you're on desktop, tablet, or phone, AI Memes is fully optimized for your device. Create memes on your phone during your commute or design on your computer—the interface adapts seamlessly to your screen size. Caption This, the meme template library, and the full editor all work perfectly on touchscreens with intuitive drag-and-drop controls and mobile-friendly buttons.
Yes! There are tons of use cases to use AI Memes for outside of memes. The tools work great for any image, GIF, or video editing needs. Create tutorial screenshots with text annotations, add subtitles to explainer videos, design eye-catching YouTube thumbnails, caption product demos, build Instagram story templates, or create branded video content for your business. If you need to put text or images on media quickly, AI Memes has you covered.
AI Memes supports PNG, JPG, and WEBP images, MP4 videos, and animated GIFs. Your download will match your upload format—bring us an image, get an image back; bring us a video, get a video back; bring us a GIF, get a GIF back.
No account required! You can start creating memes immediately without signing up. Simply visit any tool, upload or select a template, customize it, and download. However, creating a free account gives you access to features like saved projects and your meme creation history. Upgrading to AI Memes Pro removes the AI Memes watermark from your downloads and unlocks tons of powerful AI features in the full editor.
