# Megyn Kelly Essentially In November 2011, Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly told Bill O'Reilly on live TV that pepper spray was 'a food product, essentially' while discussing the UC Davis Occupy crackdown. Within 24 hours her line became an image macro template mocking euphemisms for state violence. ## Origin On November 21, 2011, Kelly appeared on Bill O'Reilly's Fox News talk show The O'Reilly Factor to discuss Lt. John Pike's pepper spraying of seated student protesters at UC Davis during an Occupy demonstration[2]. Talking about the medical effects of the spray, she described it as 'a food product, essentially,' and questioned whether the batch used at UC Davis had been diluted, though reports indicated it had not[1]. The clip aired that evening, and by the next morning it had been ripped to YouTube and passed around by bloggers covering the Occupy crackdown[2]. - **Platform:** Fox News broadcast / Reddit (image macro spread) - **Creator:** Unknown - **Date:** 2011 ## Overview The Megyn Kelly Essentially format, also called Euphemism Megyn Kelly, pairs a photograph of the Fox News anchor with a two-line caption that dismisses something horrific as mundane, always closing with the word 'essentially'[3]. Typical entries make light of pepper spray, torture, drone strikes, or other human rights abuses by reframing them as food, weather, or harmless consumer products. The joke works because Kelly's actual on-air line downplayed a chemical weapon being used against seated student protesters, so recycling her verbal tic turned her own softening rhetoric against her[1]. Most examples reuse the same broadcast still of Kelly and stick to the two-line advice-animal caption structure, with the setup asking about a violent act and the punchline dismissing it with the trademark closing word. ## How It Spread On November 22, 2011, the first image macro built from the segment was posted to Reddit with the caption 'Pepper spray? / it's a food product, essentially,' and compilations of the growing series quickly went up on Geekosystem, UpRoxx, and BuzzFeed[3]. The same day, Slacktory editor Nick Douglas submitted a Change.org petition asking Kelly to consume 'a full dose of pepper spray on national television,' offering to let her mix it into one serving of food or drink so she could relate the effects to her audience[1]. New York radio station WNYC ran an opinion segment on the meme within days of the broadcast. A Quickmeme page dedicated to Kelly image macros gathered more than 1,600 submissions by September 18, 2012, and a Facebook page titled 'If Megyn Kelly thinks pepperspray is food she should eat it' picked up over 110 likes[3]. ## How to Use Users typically start with the same news-desk photograph of Kelly, then write a two-line advice-animal caption. The first line asks about a violent or serious topic (pepper spray, waterboarding, a war crime), and the second line dismisses it as something benign, with the sentence ending on the word 'essentially.' The joke lands hardest when the euphemism is absurdly softer than the reality being described, mirroring Kelly's original 'food product' framing. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What is Megyn Kelly Essentially? It is a 2011 advice-animal image macro series, also called Euphemism Megyn Kelly, that pairs a photo of the Fox News anchor with captions dismissing violent acts as harmless everyday things, always ending in the word 'essentially'[3]. ### Where did Megyn Kelly Essentially come from? It came from Kelly's November 21, 2011 appearance on The O'Reilly Factor, where she called pepper spray 'a food product, essentially' while discussing the UC Davis pepper spray incident during an Occupy protest[2]. ### What does Megyn Kelly Essentially mean? The meme mocks the way TV news anchors soften state violence with euphemisms, turning Kelly's own dismissive phrasing against her by using it to trivialize things like torture, chemical weapons, and human rights abuses[1]. ### How do you use Megyn Kelly Essentially? You caption a Kelly news-desk photo with a two-line setup and punchline: the first line names a serious or violent thing, and the second line dismisses it as something harmless, closing on the word 'essentially'[3]. ### Is Megyn Kelly Essentially still popular? No. Its peak was late 2011 into 2012, when a Quickmeme page for Kelly macros passed 1,600 submissions by September 2012, but the advice-animal format tied to that specific news moment faded afterward[3]. ## References 1. [https://www.change.org/petitions/fox-news-anchor-eat-or-drink-a-full-dose-of-pepper-spray-on-national-television]() 2. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3n0tj41UZnA]() 3. [https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/megyn-kelly-essentially]() --- Source: https://meme.com/memes/megyn-kelly-essentially Published by meme.com — The Internet Meme Library