What is How To Talk To Short People?

It's a two-panel comic that pretends to instruct readers on the correct way to speak with a shorter person, with one option labeled 'Leave,' which later turned into an exploitable template.

Where did How To Talk To Short People come from?

Tumblr user the-grin-reaper posted the original comic on March 23rd, 2014.

What does How To Talk To Short People mean?

The original played the instruction straight as a note on politeness, but the 2017 edits used the same layout to mock short people or stage absurd 'proper' behaviors like choking.

How do you use How To Talk To Short People?

Keep the two-panel 'right vs wrong' setup and the 'Leave' caption, then swap in your own characters or a ridiculous 'correct' method for the second panel.

Is How To Talk To Short People still popular?

It's a classic exploitable that peaked with the June 2017 wave on /r/funny, 9GAG and me_irl and still shows up as a recognizable reference format.

How To Talk To Short People

2014exploitable comicclassic

Published August 29, 2026

How To Talk To Short People started as a 2014 Tumblr comic instructing readers on the 'proper' way to speak with shorter people, with the wrong method labeled 'Leave.' The panel got remixed for years before flipping into a full exploitable in 2017, spawning waves of edits where the 'correct' method involves choking, crushing or dismissing the shorter character.

exploitable templates two panel memes tumblr memes webcomic memes body image memes

Overview

How To Talk To Short People is a two-panel instructional comic that pretends to teach the polite way to address someone shorter than you. The original setup shows a tall figure bending down to meet the shorter person at eye level, while the 'wrong' option, a figure leaning over from above, gets slapped with the caption 'Leave'1. The joke reads earnest at first glance, which is exactly what made it easy to twist later.

By 2017 the format flipped into a full exploitable. Editors kept the two-panel 'correct vs incorrect' scaffolding but swapped in absurd or hostile 'proper' behaviors, from choking the shorter person to reversing which method is polite2. The humor turned on that clean instructional layout getting hijacked into something menacing or dumb, and the rigid template made it easy for anyone to draw or paste in their own version3.

Gallery

Origin & Background

Platform

Tumblr (source) / Reddit and 9GAG (viral spread)

Creator

the-grin-reaper

Date

2014

On March 23rd, 2014, Tumblr user the-grin-reaper posted the original 'How to talk with short people' comic, showing a tall figure leaning over a shorter one and marking that pose as the option to 'Leave'1. The post picked up more than 234,700 notes over the following years3.

The comic circulated in its unedited form for a while before anyone treated it as a template. Its exploitable turn came later, once other users started redrawing the two panels with their own characters and captions3.

How It Spread

The first notable redraw arrived in June 2014, when a version starring Kuroko no Basket characters in a chibi style was posted to Rebloggy4. Edits stayed sporadic for a couple of years. On December 21st, 2016, a variation that reversed which method counted as 'proper' appeared on the Russian site Funkysouls.com3.

The exploitable wave really landed in mid-2017. On June 13th, that reversed version hit /r/funny5. Eleven days later, on June 24th, a variation showing the taller person choking the shorter one was posted to 9GAG, where it pulled in over 5,900 points2. From there the format bled into me_irl, with the most-upvoted edit in that run clearing 20,000 points3.

After the 2017 spike the template settled into steady rotation as a reaction and shitpost format, with the original 'Leave' panel still the recognizable anchor whenever the setup gets reused1.

How to Use This Meme

The template typically keeps the two-panel 'right way vs wrong way' layout from the original comic. Creators usually preserve the height gap between the two figures and the instructional caption style, then swap the 'correct' behavior for something absurd, aggressive or off-topic. Common conventions include reversing which panel is marked 'Leave,' redrawing the figures as fandom characters, or replacing the shorter person entirely with an object or animal3.