Miss Teen South Carolina

Bottom Line: Miss Teen South Carolina is a classic embarrassment meme with its basis in television. It has gone down in history as one of the most memorable quotations of 2007 and goes to prove that whenever you combine live television and semi-coherent ramblings a meme is on the horizon.

As part of a question and answer portion of the 2007 Miss Teen USA pageant, Upton was asked by the questioner, Friday Night Lights actress Aimee Teegarden, “Recent polls have shown a fifth of Americans can’t locate the U.S. on a world map. Why do you think this is so?”

Upton responded:

I personally believe that U.S. Americans are unable to do so because, uh, some, people out there in our nation don’t have maps and, uh, I believe that our, uh, education like such as, uh, South Africa and, uh, the Iraq, everywhere like such as, and, I believe that they should, our education over here in the U.S. should help the U.S., uh, or, uh, should help South Africa and should help the Iraq and the Asian countries, so we will be able to build up our future, for our . . . .

According to YouTube, video clips of her response on the website have had over 40 million views. It was the site’s most viewed video for the month of September 2007. Many YouTube users made their own parodies of the incident. The Yale Book of Quotations designated the response the second most memorable quote of 2007.

[Link]

Meme Anatomy: Pop Culture, Embarrassment

Urban Dictionary

A title associated with Lauren Caitlin Upton, Miss South Carolina in the Miss Teen USA Pageant 2007, made famous by her answer to the following question asked by Amiee Teegarden:

“Recent polls have shown a fifth of American’s can’t locate the U.S. on a world map. Why do you think this is?”

Other Sources

Videos: Miss Teen South Carolina

Pictures: Miss Teen South Carolina

Meme Strength

Video Search Results: 4,320 – 3
Photo Search Results: 17,400 – 4
Search Volume: 63,900 – 2.5
Blog Search Results: 7,660 – 2.5
News Search Results: 250 – 3

Overall Rating:

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