Later, in the Cold War era, Neo-Dada arose in response to the consumer culture and mass media of the 1950s. They rejected conventional notions of art, in turn creating anti-art with no clear purpose that mirrored the senselessness of war. The original Dadaists were European radical leftists who traded the reason, rationale and aestheticism of the warmongering status quo for absurdity, irrationality and anti-capitalism. The Dada movement evolved in reaction to World War I and disillusionment over war, violence, capitalism and nationalism. What makes millennial humor so nihilistic and absurdist? I think the best way to understand memes like these is to analogize them to a century-old movement: Dadaism. Building on the Tide Pod meme, the Forbidden Snacks meme includes ingesting other household objects that resemble edible treats such as Dungeons and Dragons dice, bath bombs and Himalayan Salt Lamps, to name a few. Social media subcultures like Weird Facebook and Black Twitter share images of bleach in response to undesirable content or to self-deprecate about their mental health. Generational jokes about death via consumer goods aren't new. Before the Tide Pod meme there was the "drinking bleach" meme, a joke about committing suicide by (obviously) drinking bleach. And it’s not the first time in history a generation has behaved this way in response to the world they were brought up in. And our own culture-making - this kind of nihilistic, cynical humor epitomized in memes like eating Tide Pods - is merely a reflection of our worldview. We have a dismal economic outlook, the worst of any generation born since the Great Depression. Millennials - who were born and raised on the internet and produce and consume much of their culture there - have had our whole lives characterized by economic anxiety. Yet if you were perplexed, even baffled, by the staying power of internet jokes about absurd, brand-inspired forms of suicide, there’s a simple explanation. Indeed, both the Tide brand and health professionals have urged the public not to eat the pods, as even a small amount of the detergent can cause diarrhea, vomiting, breathing issues and, at worst, death. Why would anyone willingly risk their health to eat a toxic Tide laundry detergent pod? Most adults are probably baffled by a viral Internet meme that has inspired dozens of young people to ingest the colorful capsules filled with laundry detergent for internet laughs.