What is Successful Black Man?

It's an advice animal image macro built around a stock photo of a black man in a business suit, where the top caption teases a racial stereotype and the bottom caption reveals a bland or respectable punchline.

Where did Successful Black Man come from?

The base photo comes from a ShutterStock listing, and an anonymous creator told Know Your Meme they came up with the format after reverse-discrimination discussions at work, first posting to 4chan before setting up a Meme Generator page in 2010.

What does Successful Black Man mean?

It's a bait-and-switch joke: the reader expects a racist stereotype from the top line and gets an innocuous, upstanding punchline on the bottom, following the same structural gag used in Ordinary Muslim Man.

How do you use Successful Black Man?

Write a top caption that sets up a stereotype and a bottom caption that reframes it as something ordinary, professional, or wholesome, then post to the Meme Generator template that hosts tens of thousands of user versions.

Is Successful Black Man still popular?

It peaked between 2010 and 2013, with the Meme Generator page passing 26,000 submissions and Quickmeme topping 40,000 by January 2013, and is now regarded as a classic entry in the advice animal era rather than an active trend.

Successful Black Man

2010image macroclassic

Published September 29, 2026

Successful Black Man is an advice animal image macro from 2010 that flips racial stereotypes through a bait-and-switch caption. Started on 4chan and Meme Generator with a stock photo of a black man in a black suit, the format drew tens of thousands of submissions and an UpRoxx write-up calling it 'borderline offensive, but hilarious.'

advice animals bait and switch memes stereotype memes race and identity memes early 2010s memes

Overview

The format centers a stock photo of a black man wearing a black business suit against the brown and beige color wheel used across advice animal templates3. Each image works the same way: the top caption teases a stereotype about African Americans, and the bottom caption swings into something bland, professional, or upstanding, killing the joke's own setup3. The structural gag is the same one used in the Ordinary Muslim Man image macro, which does the trick with religious stereotypes instead of racial ones3.

Meme Generator became the workhorse for the series, with users cranking out captions by the tens of thousands on the dedicated page4. UpRoxx summed the whole thing up as 'borderline offensive, but hilarious' in its August 2011 write-up1.

Gallery

Origin & Background

Platform

4chan / Meme Generator (viral spread)

Creator

Unknown

Date

2010

The photo behind the template came from a ShutterStock listing titled 'Handsome African American business man dressed in a black suit'10. According to an anonymous email the creator sent to Know Your Meme, the idea came out of reverse-discrimination discussions at their workplace3. The template and its earliest captions first showed up in scattered 4chan /b/ threads, and a Meme Generator page dedicated to the format went live in 20104.

How It Spread

FunnyJunk user SamuelOak posted a compilation of standout captions on February 25, 2010, pulling over 39,000 views and 448 upvotes in the years that followed2. A Tumblr blog dedicated to the format launched on September 14, 2010 and stayed active through November 20118. Ebaumsworld ran a slideshow titled 'Successful Negro' on November 5, 20115, and BodyBuildingForums member aaandrew opened a favorite-examples thread on December 286.

UpRoxx covered the meme on August 31, 20111, and an anonymous 4chan /b/ thread from October 6, 2011 pulled over 115 replies before archiving7. By January 2013, Meme Generator had over 26,000 submissions on its Successful Black Man page4 and Quickmeme had accumulated more than 40,0009. YouTuber TheWordsmithjr began acting captions out on video on January 15, 201211.

Timeline

2012-01-15

YouTuber TheWordsmithjr begins uploading videos acting out image macro captions.

2013-01

Meme Generator page passes 26,000 submissions; Quickmeme page passes 40,000.

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How to Use This Meme

Pick a stereotype about African Americans that a reader will see coming from the top line, then use the bottom line to reveal a wholesome, professional, or upstanding punchline that reframes the setup as innocuous. Common conventions include job titles, family life, hobbies, or clean grammar as the bottom-line twist.