What is Public Resignation?

Public Resignation is the trend of quitting a job as a staged public act, usually a YouTube video, photo stunt, or widely-circulated open letter.

Where did Public Resignation come from?

The earliest documented example is a January 25th, 2007 YouTube video by jo low showing a Moe's restaurant employee pulling off an 'I Quit' shirt reveal set to 'Ice Ice Baby'.

What does Public Resignation mean?

It means framing a resignation as content for an audience rather than a private HR matter, often by filming the walkout or publishing a signed letter aimed at readers outside the company.

How do you use Public Resignation?

The common formula is a music cue, a reveal (a shirt, a sign, a cake), and a camera rolling as the worker leaves the building, with the clip uploaded the same day; written versions follow the open-letter format popularized by Greg Smith's Times op-ed.

Is Public Resignation still popular?

The format is a classic workplace stunt that keeps producing high-profile exits, from Steven Slater's 2010 JetBlue slide to Marina Shifrin's 2013 dance resignation that pulled 5.77 million views in three days.

Public Resignation

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Published October 8, 2026

Public Resignation is the act of quitting a job in a theatrical, broadcast-ready way, often filmed for YouTube or posted as an open letter online. The format took off in the late 2000s with workers staging shirt reveals, intercom speeches, and dance routines, and it kept producing viral moments into the 2010s with high-profile exits like JetBlue's Steven Slater and Marina Shifrin's dance-quit clip.

work memes participatory video memes youtube culture memes late 2000s memes accidental fame memes

Overview

Public Resignation describes the trend of quitting a job as public performance, whether that means a YouTube video, a photo stunt, or a widely-shared open letter. The format pulls humor and catharsis from the gap between the usual private two-weeks-notice and a loud, choreographed exit meant for strangers to watch1.

The clips tend to share a few recurring beats: a shirt reveal with 'I Quit' written on the chest, a soundtrack cue like 'Ice Ice Baby' or 'Bohemian Rhapsody,' an intercom speech aimed at coworkers, or a full dance routine filmed on the way out1 3. Written versions follow the same logic in a different register, with resignation letters that read like essays about workplace culture rather than HR paperwork5.

What ties the examples together is the audience, not the industry. Fast-food workers, hotel staff, teachers, airline crew, and Goldman Sachs executives all show up on the roster, each borrowing the same playbook of making a private decision into a shareable scene1 5.

Gallery

Origin & Background

Platform

YouTube

Creator

jo low

Date

2007

The earliest known entry in the format was uploaded to YouTube on January 25th, 2007 by user jo low under the title 'My Manager Quits.' The clip shows a Moe's Southwest Grill employee pulling his shirt open to reveal 'I Quit' written underneath while 'Ice Ice Baby' by Vanilla Ice plays in the background2.

Shirt-reveal exits became a template on YouTube over the following year. On April 7th, 2008, That Guy With Glasses posted 'How I Quit My Job,' walking into his workplace to the '2001: A Space Odyssey' theme before stripping off his shirt to reveal the same 'I Quit' message and strolling out to Queen's 'Bohemian Rhapsody'1.

How It Spread

The format jumped from a one-off joke to a recognizable trend over 2007 and 2008. On October 10th, 2007, YouTuber kia9494 posted 'How To Quit Ur Job at Walmart,' footage of a Walmart employee announcing his resignation over the store intercom, and the video pulled more than 670,000 views over the next six years3. A March 2009 Flickr photo of Neil Berrett holding a sheet cake inscribed with his resignation letter from the Hunters Point Naval Shipyard pushed the stunt beyond video into physical props1.

2010 brought the first mainstream crossover. JetBlue flight attendant Steven Slater reportedly quit over a plane's intercom on August 9th, 2010, grabbed two beers, and deployed the emergency slide, drawing national news coverage and a court case that ended with a mental health program and a $10,000 fine1. The same month, TheCHIVE ran photos of a woman holding white-board messages aimed at her boss, later revealed as a prank with Los Angeles actress Elyse Porterfield playing the quitter1.

The written strain hit its peak in 2012 and 2013. On March 14th, 2012, Goldman Sachs executive Greg Smith published 'Why I Am Leaving Goldman Sachs' in The New York Times, calling out what he described as a client-hostile culture at the firm5. On October 12th, 2011, Renaissance Providence Hotel employee Joey DeFrancesco quit on video accompanied by a brass marching band, pulling more than four million views in two years4. Marina Shifrin's September 28th, 2013 dance resignation from Next Media Animation, set to Kanye West's 'Gone,' broke 5.77 million views inside 72 hours and drew a dance-video reply from her former employer days later6 7.

Timeline

2008-04-07

That Guy With Glasses releases 'How I Quit My Job,' a shirt-reveal exit scored to Queen's 'Bohemian Rhapsody.'

2009-03-13

Flickr user Neil Berrett posts a photo of a sheet cake inscribed with his resignation letter.

2010-08-09

JetBlue flight attendant Steven Slater quits over the intercom and exits via the emergency slide.

2011-10-12

Joey DeFrancesco films his resignation from Renaissance Providence Hotel backed by a marching band.

2012-03-14

Greg Smith publishes 'Why I Am Leaving Goldman Sachs' in The New York Times.

How to Use This Meme

A typical Public Resignation video opens inside the workplace, hits a music cue, and ends with the worker leaving the building on camera. Common conventions include a shirt or sign reveal, a direct address to a manager or coworker, a prop like a cake or marching band, and uploading the footage to YouTube the same day. Written versions often take the shape of an open letter posted to Facebook or submitted to a newspaper op-ed page, naming the employer and the specific grievance1 5.