I'm Joining the War on Drugs on the Side of Drugs — Comic-book muscleman with hammer beside bold text reading 'I'm joining the war on drugs on the side of the

I'm Joining the War on Drugs on the Side of Drugs

2021catchphraseclassic

Published November 5, 2026

I'm Joining the War on Drugs on the Side of Drugs started as a July 2021 tweet from @yngjcb joking about defecting to the drugs' team in the drug war. Within three days, Redditor SnackToTheThird fused the line with a superhero Karl Marx image, and by December 2021 Twitter users were recaptioning Squid Game screencaps with the same template.

snowclone memes bait and switch memes image macro memes catchphrase memes absurdist humor memes

Overview

I'm Joining the War on Drugs on the Side of Drugs runs on a fake-out structure: a sincere-sounding commitment reverses allegiance in the final clause, so 'I'm Joining the War on X on the Side of Y' lands as a punchline rather than a position1. Image macro versions pair that caption with Karl Marx drawn as a caped superhero, art lifted from the Spanish cover of Tom Morris's Superheroes and Philosophy4.

Recaption versions swap the Marx drawing for unrelated screencaps while keeping the war-on-X cadence intact. Common choices mount the text over a reality-show still or a cartoon scene, which flips the setup into a visual non sequitur78.

Origin & Background

Platform
Twitter (origin tweet) / Reddit (viral image macro)
Creator
@yngjcb and Redditor SnackToTheThird
Date
2021

Twitter user @yngjcb posted the viral version on July 27th, 2021, writing 'joining the war on drugs but on the side of the drugs.' That tweet collected over 206,000 likes and 27,600 retweets across its first two years1. The same gag had surfaced twice before from @carlos_valencia, first in February 20122 and again in July 20183, but neither post caught on at the time.

Three days after @yngjcb's tweet, Redditor SnackToTheThird paired the quote with a superhero Karl Marx illustration and posted it to /r/196 on July 30th, 2021, where it collected more than 5,900 upvotes4. The Marx artwork originally ran on the Spanish edition cover of Tom Morris's Superheroes and Philosophy9.

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How It Spread

Tumblr user guerrillatech reblogged the Ketamine Marx macro on August 2nd, 2021, where it gathered over 12,900 reblogs and 18,600 likes within two years5. On October 16th, 2021, voice actor Luke Correia uploaded a dramatic voiced reading to YouTube that passed 437,000 views in one year6.

By late December 2021, the image macro had shifted into a recaption template. Twitter user @spacemacchiato swapped the Marx art for a Squid Game screencap on December 25th, 20217, and @decafmari_ posted another recaption on January 22nd, 2022 that earned over 40 retweets and 310 likes8. Know Your Meme logged the catchphrase and image macro versions holding steady through 2022 and early 20239.

Timeline

2012-02-26

@carlos_valencia posts an early version of the joke on Twitter; it fails to catch on[2].

2018-07-22

@carlos_valencia reposts the same joke; again no significant traction[3].

2021-07-27

@yngjcb tweets 'joining the war on drugs but on the side of the drugs,' which goes viral[1].

2021-07-30

Redditor SnackToTheThird posts the Ketamine Marx image macro to /r/196[4].

2021-08-02

Tumblr user guerrillatech reblogs the macro and pushes it to wider audiences[5].

2021-10-16

Voice actor Luke Correia uploads a voiced reading of the meme to YouTube[6].

2021-12-25

@spacemacchiato debuts the Squid Game recaption variant[7].

2022-01-22

@decafmari_ posts another recaption that keeps the war-on-X cadence over a new image[8].

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How to Use This Meme

Plug any cause into 'War on X' and name the opposing 'side' as Y, so the sentence first reads like a declaration before flipping sides at the comma. Posts often use plain text, the superhero Karl Marx macro, or a recaption image with the caption pasted over an unrelated screenshot7.

Frequently Asked Questions