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''Simp'' () is an internet slang term describing someone who shows excessive sympathy and attention toward another person, typically to someone who does not reciprocate the same feelings, in pursuit of affection or a
sexual relationship An intimate relationship is an interpersonal relationship that involves emotional or physical closeness between people and may include sexual intimacy and feelings of Romance (love), romance or love. Intimate relationships are Interdependence ...
. This behavior, known as ''simping'', is carried out toward a variety of targets, including celebrities, politicians, e-girls, and e-boys. The term had sporadic usage until gaining traction on social media in 2019.


Origins

Originally a shortening of "
simpleton __NOTOC__ In folklore, a simpleton is a person whose foolish actions are the subject of often-repeated stories. Simpletons are also known as noodles or fools. Folklore often holds, with no basis in fact, that certain towns or countries are thoug ...
", the '' New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English'' traces usage of the noun ''simp'' to 1903. An article in the February 1917 edition of ''Motion Picture Magazine'' by Arthur Le Kaser has an animated drawing of a female director yelling at a male leading man through a megaphone "Kiss Her You Simp, Hurry Up Camera!" The shortening has appeared, for example, in ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' as early as 1923, when the paper reported on a letter by one Lillian Henderson criticizing the members of two clubs in
Atlantic City Atlantic City, sometimes referred to by its initials A.C., is a Jersey Shore seaside resort city in Atlantic County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. Atlantic City comprises the second half of the Atlantic City- Hammonton metropolitan sta ...
for unmarried men:
Those bachelor simps are afraid to take a chance and too tight to share their earnings with a wife.
''Simp'' began to have the connotation of someone being "soft" and "overly sympathetic" in the 1980s, when it was used by West Coast rappers such as Hugh E.M.C.,
Too Short Todd Anthony Shaw (born April 28, 1966), better known by his stage name Too Short (stylized as Too $hort), is an American rapper. A pioneer of West Coast hip-hop, Shaw was among the first acts to receive recognition in the genre during the late ...
, and
E-40 Earl Tywone Stevens (born November 15, 1967), better known by his stage name E-40, is an American rapper. Stevens is a founding member of the rap group The Click (band), The Click and the founder of Sick Wid It Records. He has released 27 stud ...
. Simp was referenced by Sir Mix-a-Lot in his 1992 hit "Baby Got Back" in the lyrics, "A lot of simps won't like this song".
2Pac Tupac Amaru Shakur (; born Lesane Parish Crooks; June 16, 1971 – September 13, 1996), also known by his stage names 2Pac and Makaveli, was an American rapper and actor, regarded as one of the greatest and most influential rappers of all tim ...
also used the term in his song "If I Die 2Nite" on his 1995 album ''
Me Against the World ''Me Against the World'' is the third studio album by American rapper 2Pac. It was released on March 14, 1995, by Interscope Records and Out da Gutta Records and distributed by Atlantic Records. 2Pac draws lyrical inspiration from his impend ...
''. In 1999, the term was used in the
Three 6 Mafia Three 6 Mafia is an American hip-hop group from Memphis, Tennessee, formed in 1991. Emerging as a horror-themed underground hip-hop group, they went on to enjoy mainstream success. The group's 1995 debut album ''Mystic Stylez'' became an influen ...
song " Sippin' on Some Syrup" as an antonym for ''
pimp Procuring, pimping, or pandering is the facilitation or provision of a prostitute or other sex worker in the arrangement of a sex act with a customer. A procurer, colloquially called a pimp (if male) or a madam (if female, though the term "pimp" ...
''; Too Short has described a "simp" as equivalent to "a knockoff pimp". The term has been expressed as a
backronym A backronym is an acronym formed from an already existing word by expanding its letters into the words of a phrase. Backronyms may be invented with either serious or humorous intent, or they may be a type of false etymology or folk etymology. The ...
for ''Sucker/Sucka Idolizing Mediocre
Pussy ''Pussy'' () is an English noun, adjective, and—in rare instances—verb. It has several meanings, as slang, as euphemism, and as vulgarity. Most commonly, it is used as a noun with the meaning "cat", or "coward" or " weakling". In slang, ...
'', which according to '' Gizmodo Australia'' is "telling of its 20th century origins". A definition of ''simp'' appeared on ''
Urban Dictionary ''Urban Dictionary'' is a crowdsourced English-language online dictionary for slang words and phrases. The website was founded in 1999 by Aaron Peckham. Originally, ''Urban Dictionary'' was intended as a dictionary of slang or cultural word ...
'' in 2003, and the word continued to be used by rappers into the 2010s, when it was adopted by members of the
manosphere The manosphere is a varied collection of websites, blogs, and online forums promoting masculinity, misogyny, and opposition to feminism. Communities within the manosphere include men's rights activists (MRAs), incels (involuntary celibates), ...
,
incel Incel ( ; a portmanteau of "involuntary celibate") is a term associated with an online subculture of mostly male and heterosexual people who define themselves as unable to find a romantic or sexual partner despite desiring one. They ofte ...
, and MGTOW (
Men Going Their Own Way Men Going Their Own Way (MGTOW ) is an anti-feminist, misogynistic, mostly online community that espouses male separatism from what they see as a gynocentric society that has been corrupted by feminism. MGTOW specifically advocate for men ...
) forums alongside similar derogatory terms such as '' cuck'', ''
beta Beta (, ; uppercase , lowercase , or cursive ; or ) is the second letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of 2. In Ancient Greek, beta represented the voiced bilabial plosive . In Modern Greek, it represe ...
'', and ''
white knight A white knight is a mythological figure and literary stock character. They are portrayed alongside a black knight as diametric opposites. A white knight usually represents a heroic warrior fighting against evil, with the role in medieval literatu ...
''.The word became widely popular on
TikTok TikTok, known in mainland China and Hong Kong as Douyin (), is a social media and Short-form content, short-form online video platform owned by Chinese Internet company ByteDance. It hosts user-submitted videos, which may range in duration f ...
in 2019, and soon also became popular on Twitch and
Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...
. According to
Google Trends Google Trends is a website by Google that analyzes the popularity of top search queries in Google Search across various regions and languages. The website uses graphs to compare the search volume of different queries over a certain period of ti ...
, interest in the term doubled between late 2018 and late 2019. The word has been used by some fan communities who call themselves "simps" for a celebrity figure. According to ''
The Daily Dot ''The Daily Dot'' is a digital media company covering the culture of the Internet and the World Wide Web. It was founded by Nicholas White in 2011, and is headquartered in Austin, Texas. The site, conceived as the Internet's "hometown newsp ...
'', the term is often used ironically; similarly, Magdalene Taylor at ''
MEL Magazine ''MEL'' was a men's magazine headquartered in Marina del Rey, California. Originally funded by Dollar Shave Club, ''Mel'' has been described by ''New York Times'' journalist Amanda Hess as "the rare men's magazine that has taken upon itself to i ...
'' says the term is "used mostly as a joke". Nathan Grayson writes at ''
Kotaku ''Kotaku'' is a video game website and blog that was originally launched in 2004 as part of the Gawker Media network. Notable former contributors to the site include Luke Smith, Cecilia D'Anastasio, Tim Rogers, and Jason Schreier. History ...
'' that it is "difficult to find breaks in the chain of the word's linguistic lineage".


Contemporary usage

In July 2020, the official Twitter account for
Archie Comics Archie Comic Publications, Inc. (often referred to simply as Archie Comics) is an American comic book publisher headquartered in the village of Pelham, New York. The company's many titles feature the fictional teenagers Archie Andrews, Jug ...
said that it would permanently ban people from its
YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...
channel for comments calling the comics' main character,
Archie Andrews Archibald "Archie" Andrews, created in 1941 by publisher John L. Goldwater and artist Bob Montana in collaboration with writer Vic Bloom,
, a simp. ''
The A.V. Club ''The A.V. Club'' is an online newspaper and entertainment website featuring reviews, interviews, and other articles that examine films, music, television, books, games, and other elements of pop-culture media. ''The A.V. Club'' was created in ...
'' opined that, while it was "pretty safe to say that Archie Andrews is, quite simply, the simpiest of the simps," the Twitter post was likely an attempt at exploiting the
Streisand effect The Streisand effect is an unintended consequences, unintended consequence of attempts to hide, remove, or Censorship, censor information, where the effort instead increases public awareness of the information. The term was coined in 2005 by ...
for
viral marketing Viral marketing is a business strategy that uses existing social networks to promote a product mainly on various social media platforms. Its name refers to how consumers spread information about a product with other people, much in the same way th ...
. Contrary to the Twitter post, few, if any, comments on the Archie Comics YouTube channel accused the character of being a simp. In August 2020,
Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...
n politician
Bill Shorten William Richard Shorten (born 12 May 1967) is an Australian former politician and trade unionist. He was the leader of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) and Leader of the Opposition (Australia), Leader of the Opposition from 2013 to 2019. He also ...
used the term on national television, saying on an ABC segment that Prime Minister
Scott Morrison Scott John Morrison (born 13 May 1968) is an Australian former politician who served as the 30th prime minister of Australia from 2018 to 2022. He held office as leader of the Liberal Party of Australia, leader of the Liberal Party and was ...
needed "to make sure he doesn't look like he's just a simp to
Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...
". In September 2020, users of
Reddit Reddit ( ) is an American Proprietary software, proprietary social news news aggregator, aggregation and Internet forum, forum Social media, social media platform. Registered users (commonly referred to as "redditors") submit content to the ...
created a pledge called "No Simp September", similar to No Nut November (a month-long abstention from masturbation). Participation in "No Simp September" required posters to abstain from upvoting women's photos, watching
pornography Pornography (colloquially called porn or porno) is Sexual suggestiveness, sexually suggestive material, such as a picture, video, text, or audio, intended for sexual arousal. Made for consumption by adults, pornographic depictions have evolv ...
, and "giving money to online
sex workers A sex worker is a person who provides sex work, either on a regular or occasional basis. The term is used in reference to those who work in all areas of the sex industry.Oxford English Dictionary, "sex worker" According to one view, sex work is vo ...
", including " e-girls". In October, Mikael Thalen at ''The Daily Dot'' described Twitter users as "simping hard" over leaked photos of
Hunter Biden Robert Hunter Biden (born February4, 1970) is an American attorney and businessman. He is the second son of former president Joe Biden and his first wife, Neilia Hunter Biden. Hunter Biden was a founding board member of BHR Partners, a Chine ...
. A November 20 article in '' Vox'' about posting cringe on TikTok discussed the character of TikTok user Nate Varrone called "Mr. Simp Sexual", of the "biggest stars" of the genre. Varrone explained the character thus:
He's from Michigan and he had a girlfriend named Melissa that he just wants back so fucking badly ..He's just not in a good place right now, emotionally. I think he uses TikTok to fill the hole in his heart and find a new lover. The horniness this guy has, no human has ever felt that amount of horny in their entire life. It's like he has a curse. He thinks he has to hook up immediately or else he'll die.
In January 2021, ''
Vogue Vogue may refer to: Business * ''Vogue'' (magazine), a US fashion magazine ** British ''Vogue'', a British fashion magazine ** '' Vogue Adria'', a fashion magazine for former Yugoslav countries ** ''Vogue Arabia'', an Arab fashion magazine ** ' ...
'' reported on an "adoring" Instagram account of self-declared "simps" expressing affection toward then-
Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the South Caucasus * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the southeastern United States Georgia may also refer to: People and fictional characters * Georgia (name), a list of pe ...
Senate candidate
Jon Ossoff Thomas Jonathan Ossoff ( ; born February 16, 1987) is an American politician serving as the Seniority in the United States Senate, senior United States Senate, United States senator from Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia since 2021. A member of the ...
. Ossoff won the election and was sworn in as a senator on January 20, 2021.


Reception

Upon achieving broad popularity, it began to be used more loosely. In April 2020, an opinion piece in ''
Men's Health ''Men's Health'' (''MH''), published by Hearst Communications, Hearst, is the world's largest men's magazine brand, with 35 editions in 59 countries; it is the bestselling men's magazine on American newsstands. Started as a men's health magazin ...
'' described the use of the term as "pretty messed up", and men who labeled others with the term as "entitled assholes", saying, "if you've ever complimented a woman, apparently you're a simp". Hayley Soen writes at ''
The Tab ''The Tab'' is a youth news and entertainment site, published by Digitalbox Plc. It was launched at the University of Cambridge and has since expanded to over 20 universities in the United Kingdom. Now it is better known as a voice-driven pop ...
'' that "the simp has come to take the place of the softboi", describing him as "a boy who is a romantic failure ..definitely the type of boy you'd tell the girls is 'a little too nice, and "probably doesn't even have a lads' group chat"; Soen writes that the term is used "sometimes to describe even the bare minimum level of respect between a man and a woman". According to the ''
Evening Standard The ''London Standard'', formerly the ''Evening Standard'' (1904–2024) and originally ''The Standard'' (1827–1904), is a long-established regional newspaper published weekly and distributed free newspaper, free of charge in London, Engl ...
'', while "the term could also have some value if it undermines a culture of stringing people along emotionally", it also had "potentially offensive connotations". In ''The New York Times'', Ezra Marcus and Jonah Bromwich describe the term as a misogynist insult, one which "expresses discomfort with equality when it comes to gender, and offers a simple way to dismiss the people causing that discomfort". Anna María of ''The Daily Dot'' writes that while the term is mostly used "ironically and without misogynistic undertones", "it doesn't take much to be called a simp" in some anti-feminist spaces, and that "everything from pining after a crush to actually respecting women could be considered simping". Taylor writes that the idea of the "simp" most often "seems to be a guy who simply treats women well, or just not like trash" and is "just another scapegoat for MGTOW misogyny".


Twitch ban

In May 2020, ''Kotaku'' reported that Twitch was "cracking down on" custom
emote An emote is an entry in a text-based chat client that indicates an action taking place. Unlike emoticons, they are not text art, and instead describe the action using words or images (similar to emoji). Overview In most IRC chat clients, enteri ...
s using the word "simp", and had been "on a simp emote deleting spree" since late February. Twitch often requires its "partners" to submit custom emotes for approval prior to users being permitted to embed them; most of these emotes simply depicted a streamer or a fictional character holding up a sign with "SIMP" written on it, or were rasterizations of the text of the word itself. By December 2020, the word was described as a "favorite in the Twitch community" by ''
The Verge ''The Verge'' is an American Technology journalism, technology news website headquarters, headquartered in Lower Manhattan, New York City and operated by Vox Media. The website publishes news, feature stories, guidebooks, product reviews, cons ...
''. Twitch announced in December 2020 that administrative action would be taken against the accounts of streamers and commentators who used the word, along with "
incel Incel ( ; a portmanteau of "involuntary celibate") is a term associated with an online subculture of mostly male and heterosexual people who define themselves as unable to find a romantic or sexual partner despite desiring one. They ofte ...
" and "
virgin Virginity is a social construct that denotes the state of a person who has never engaged in sexual intercourse. As it is not an objective term with an operational definition, social definitions of what constitutes virginity, or the lack thereof ...
", saying that those words were offensive; Twitch COO Sara Clemens said during a "town hall" live-stream that, while use of the words would be permitted under approved circumstances, Twitch would be "proactively denying" custom emotes that included the words. This ban was part of a broader expansion of Twitch's list of forbidden content; the policy, viewable on Twitch's website, also prohibited posting that "expresses inferiority" based on "moral deficiencies". At the time of the announcement, the policy was planned to take effect on January 22, 2021. Reception to the announcement and proposed policy changes was largely negative; Bryan Rolli at ''The Daily Dot'' wrote that Twitch would "probably have a hell of a time enforcing the 'simp' ban", and ''
Gizmodo ''Gizmodo'' () is a design, technology, science, and science fiction website. It was originally launched as part of the Gawker Media network run by Nick Denton. ''Gizmodo'' also includes the sub-blogs ''io9'' and ''Earther'', which focus on pop ...
'' said sarcastically that "actual simps and virgins
ere Ere or ERE may refer to: * ''Environmental and Resource Economics'', a peer-reviewed academic journal * ERE Informatique, one of the first French video game companies * Ere language, an Austronesian language * Ebi Ere (born 1981), American-Nigeria ...
still welcome" on the streaming site. ''
Screen Rant ''Screen Rant'' is an entertainment website that offers news in the fields of television, films, video games, and comic books. It is owned by Valnet, parent of publications including Comic Book Resources, Collider, MovieWeb and XDA Developers. ...
'' said that a blanket ban on "simp", "incel" and "virgin" contrasted unfavorably with a "context is needed" policy on the much more offensive racial slur "
nigger In the English language, ''nigger'' is a racial slur directed at black people. Starting in the 1990s, references to ''nigger'' have been increasingly replaced by the euphemistic contraction , notably in cases where ''nigger'' is Use–menti ...
". According to ''
Ars Technica ''Ars Technica'' is a website covering news and opinions in technology, science, politics, and society, created by Ken Fisher and Jon Stokes in 1998. It publishes news, reviews, and guides on issues such as computer hardware and software, sci ...
'', Twitch had an "inconsistent history in responding to reports of problematic behavior". In interviews with ''
Kotaku ''Kotaku'' is a video game website and blog that was originally launched in 2004 as part of the Gawker Media network. Notable former contributors to the site include Luke Smith, Cecilia D'Anastasio, Tim Rogers, and Jason Schreier. History ...
'', people affected by the ban described their channels' use of the term as mostly benign—one streamer said it was "mostly banter and, in some cases, a compliment". Another streamer, while acknowledging that the word was sometimes used to describe "quite creepy" behavior, said her use of a "simp" emote was "mainly just a joke within my community".


See also

*
Glossary of Generation Z slang Slang used or popularized by Generation Z (Gen Z; generally those born between 1997 and 2012 in the Western world) differs from slang of earlier generations; ease of communication via Internet social media has facilitated its rapid proliferatio ...
* Reply guy * Beta male *
Nice guy "Nice guy" is an informal term, commonly used with either a literal or a sarcastic meaning, for a man. In the literal sense, the term describes a man who is agreeable, gentle, compassionate, sensitive, and vulnerable. The term is used both po ...
* Soy boy


References


External links

* {{Manosphere 1900s neologisms 1980s slang 1990s slang 2010s slang 2019 in Internet culture 2020s slang African-American slang Celebrity fandom Hip-hop phrases Human sexuality Internet slang Interpersonal attraction Manosphere Pejorative terms for people