I think that most of us can agree that we turn to memes when we want to chill.

Most of the time when I pick up my phone, I’m not signing up to be stressed out or challenged. All I want is a few minutes of mental downtime. With so much out there in the world seemingly designed to drain us, this screen time is an important pressure valve. Memes should be a part of that, as opposed to yet another thing that frustrates us.

That being said, there is a time and place for memes that engage, enrage, or gross us out. They are just another piece of proof of them as an art form. The majority of meme consumers are not looking for that, though, and that is completely fine. Not every piece of internet humor needs to be thought-provoking to be worthwhile.

For anyone who treats memes as visual background noise, a list such as this one is the perfect distraction. It jumps from topic to topic, offering digestible moments of humor that never linger long enough to become uncomfortable or tiring. Nothing here demands too much emotional investment, and that’s part of the appeal. Not every image is going to be smiles and positivity, but that is just a part of how humor works. There is an emotional range here. These are the kinds of images you can scroll through with your brain switched halfway off, and quite a lot of the time, that is exactly what most of us need.