Deal With It

2005Catchphrase / Reaction GIF / Image Macroclassic

Published March 10, 2026 · Updated March 18, 2026

Also known as: Smugdog · Deal With It Sunglasses

"Deal With It" is a catchphrase turned into an iconic animated GIF format where sunglasses drop onto a subject's face, signaling smug dismissal. The meme traces back to Something Awful forums in the mid-2000s and exploded in 2010 when Dump.fm hosted a GIF-making contest that standardized the falling-sunglasses template. It became one of the internet's go-to reaction formats for shutting down criticism with style.

gif memesexploitable templatescatchphrase memesdismissal memessomething awful memes

Overview

The "Deal With It" meme centers on a simple but satisfying visual gag: a pair of pixelated sunglasses descends from the top of the frame and lands on the subject's face, paired with the text "deal with it." The format works as an all-purpose mic drop. Someone doesn't like your opinion? Your lifestyle? Your choices? Slap some shades on and tell them to deal with it.

The phrase itself is older than the internet, but the meme version fuses attitude with animation. The sunglasses are the key ingredient. They transform any image or photo into a statement of unbothered confidence. The format is dead simple to replicate, which helped it spread across every platform from Tumblr to Twitter to Reddit.

Origin & Background

Platform
Something Awful (smugdog GIF), Dump.fm (falling sunglasses GIF format)
Key People
Matt Furie, Ryder Ripps, jertronic
Date
2005 (catchphrase in webcomic form), 2010 (GIF format explosion)

The colloquial phrase "deal with it" has been around long before the internet, functioning as a blunt way to tell someone to accept a situation4. The meme version started taking shape in the mid-2000s across multiple fronts.

In mid-to-late 2005, Matt Furie, the artist behind the Pepe the Frog webcomic *Boy's Club*, posted a comic on MySpace that used the phrase "deal with it"4. Around the same time on Something Awful's forums, users created what became known as the "smugdog" GIF, an animated image of a dog with a self-satisfied expression. The exact creation date of the smugdog is unclear, but it became a staple of SA's FYAD (Fuck You And Die) subforum4.

In December 2008, a graphic of Pac-Man captioned "I'm Atheist / deal with it" was uploaded to Bibanon.org, a wiki archiving Something Awful and other early-internet culture. The page described it as "the source of the 'deal with it' meme" and identified it as a "FYAD Flag" from Something Awful5.

How It Spread

The meme's defining moment came in mid-2010 when Dump.fm, a real-time image-sharing community, ran a "deal with it" GIF contest6. Site producer Ryder Ripps later told Know Your Meme that the Something Awful smugdog image directly inspired the GIF series4. The contest standardized what would become the meme's signature format: sunglasses dropping onto a subject from above.

The GIFs jumped to Tumblr on June 4th, 2010, when Dump.fm admin jertronic posted one to his personal blog4. The post gained traction when Tumblr users Greg Rutter and Brad O'Farrell reblogged it, pushing it into wider circulation24.

On July 25th, 2010, the web culture blog Urlesque published an article titled "Deal With It - 9 New GIFs From Dump.fm," calling the format a great response for online arguments and noting the growing collection of variations1. The same day, someone registered the single-serving site DealWithIt.net, featuring a version of the smugdog GIF4. On August 3rd, 2010, photographer Chris Clanton took the meme offline entirely, creating a photoset of real-life "Deal With It" recreations complete with physical falling sunglasses7.

By fall 2010, the format had enough cultural weight that a definition was added to Something Awful's SAClodpedia on October 6th, referencing both the image macros and animated GIFs4.

The meme hit mainstream sports culture on March 7th, 2011, when the Twitter hashtag #DealWithIt became a trending topic4. The backstory: during a February 2011 basketball game between Ohio State and Wisconsin, OSU freshman star Jared Sullinger was allegedly spat on by a Wisconsin fan. When asked about it, Wisconsin coach Bo Ryan dismissed the allegations with "all I know is, we won the game. Deal with it"3. Ohio State's student section responded by producing 1,400 red embroidered towels reading "DEAL WITH IT" for the next matchup3. The hashtag took off around 6 AM that morning and trended throughout the day4.

Rhyming spinoffs also emerged early on, including "Seal with it," "Feel with it," and "Peel with it," as the format's simplicity invited playful wordplay1.

Platforms

RedditTwitterTikTokInstagram
View on Google Trends

How to Use This Meme

The "Deal With It" format typically follows a simple recipe:

1

Pick your subject. Any image or short video clip works. Animals, celebrities, cartoon characters, and selfies are all common choices.

2

Add falling sunglasses. The classic version uses pixelated black sunglasses that descend from the top of the frame and land on the subject's face. Dump.fm originally provided a Photoshop template for this6.

3

Include the text. "Deal with it" appears somewhere in the frame, usually at the bottom. Some versions skip the text entirely and let the sunglasses do the talking.

4

Deploy strategically. The GIF works best as a conversation-ender. Someone criticizes your take? Reply with the GIF. The sunglasses say everything.

Create Your Own

Cultural Impact

The meme crossed from internet forums into real-world culture remarkably fast. The Ohio State towel incident in 2011 showed how the phrase could be weaponized in sports rivalries, with 1,400 physical towels printed and distributed at a major college basketball game3. The #DealWithIt hashtag trending on Twitter that same day marked one of the meme's biggest mainstream moments4.

Chris Clanton's real-life photo recreations in August 2010 were an early example of bringing a digital meme format into physical space, with staged photos of people in Fayetteville, Arkansas having sunglasses dropped on them7.

The meme also played a role in the broader evolution of reaction GIF culture. Before "Deal With It," most internet catchphrases were text-based. The falling sunglasses format helped establish the animated reaction GIF as a communication tool, paving the way for the GIF-based conversations that would dominate Twitter, Tumblr, and messaging apps throughout the 2010s.

Fun Facts

The Dump.fm GIF contest that sparked the format's explosion was held in May 2010, a full month before the GIFs started going viral on Tumblr4.

Google search interest for "deal with it" spiked notably in mid-2007, but that was mostly because of Corbin Bleu's High School Musical song of the same name, not the meme4.

The Ohio State student section's anti-Wisconsin campaign had a two-pronged approach: the "Deal With It" towels AND a "grayout" asking fans to wear gray instead of red, with the slogan "Don't Be Caught Dead in Wisconsin Red"3.

Dump.fm provided a downloadable Photoshop template so users could make their own falling-sunglasses GIFs16.

Derivatives & Variations

Smugdog

— The original Something Awful animated GIF of a smug-looking dog that inspired the entire falling-sunglasses format[4].

Rhyming spinoffs

— "Seal with it," "Feel with it," and "Peel with it" emerged early in the meme's life as playful wordplay variations[1].

DealWithIt.net

— A single-serving website created July 25th, 2010, featuring a variation of the smugdog GIF[4].

Real-life recreations

— Photographer Chris Clanton staged physical "Deal With It" scenes with actual falling sunglasses in Fayetteville, Arkansas[7].

Pac-Man Atheist

— An early image macro featuring Pac-Man saying "I'm Atheist / deal with it," uploaded to Bibanon.org in December 2008[5].

Frequently Asked Questions