GOD Bless The U.S.A — Group of young men watching a footwork dancer in front of a green screen with '9/11 TAKIN OVER' text overlay

GOD Bless The U.S.A

2008viral videoclassic

Published September 12, 2026

GOD Bless The U.S.A, also known as 9/11 Footwerk Takin Over, is a 2008 YouTube video of Chicago footwork dancers performing to a hardcore remix of Lee Greenwood's patriotic anthem. Uploaded two days after the September 11th anniversary, the clip circulated for years as absurdist patriotic ephemera and sparked a small wave of YTPMV edits.

dance memes youtube poop memes late 2000s memes mashup video memes music memes

Overview

GOD Bless The U.S.A, also known as 9/11 Footwerk Takin Over, is a low-resolution YouTube clip that pairs Chicago footwork dancing with a sped-up hardcore remix of Lee Greenwood's 'God Bless The U.S.A.'1 The video runs about a minute and captures several dancers trading off battle-style routines, the mismatch between the earnest patriotic vocals and the frantic footwork tempo giving the clip its cult appeal2.

The title's spelling, 'footwerk' with an 'e' and the '9/11 takin over' framing, became part of the meme itself, quoted verbatim in reposts and video responses1. Fans later produced YouTube Poop Music Videos (YTPMVs) built around the audio, treating the remix as raw material for further edits rather than as a straight dance clip2.

Origin & Background

Platform
YouTube
Creator
djyungtellem
Date
2008

The video was uploaded to YouTube on September 13th, 2008, by user djyungtellem, two days after the September 11th anniversary1. It shows footwork performers, the fast, footcentric Chicago street-dance style, cutting up on camera to a bootleg hardcore edit of Lee Greenwood's 1984 country ballad 'God Bless The U.S.A.'2.

The original video is still hosted on djyungtellem's YouTube channel and has accumulated more than 399,000 views over seventeen years12.

How It Spread

The clip circulated slowly rather than going viral in a burst. YouTube commenters and small music blogs traded the link for years as an example of the footwork scene bleeding into unlikely source material, and the audio was repurposed by YTPMV creators who layered new visuals and cuts over the remix2.

By the late 2010s the video had crossed 399,000 views on YouTube, mostly through link sharing on forums and image boards rather than any single mainstream write-up1. Know Your Meme documented the clip in its meme database, noting the fan edits and YTPMVs it inspired2.

Timeline

2008-09-13

Djyungtellem uploads the footwork video set to a remix of 'God Bless The U.S.A.' to YouTube.

2008-09

Video begins circulating on YouTube in the weeks after the September 11th anniversary.

2025

The original upload passes 399,000 lifetime views on YouTube.

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