PewDiePie with bleached blond hair next to large white text reading 'RESPECT WAMEN'

Wamen

2017catchphraseclassic

Published October 5, 2026

Wamen is a deliberately mangled pronunciation of "women" popularized in June 2017 after YouTuber PewDiePie made a video riffing on the Respect Women image macros. The exaggerated vowel caught on with his audience, spawning a running catchphrase, Urban Dictionary entries, and a wave of fan edits that defined a stretch of PewDiePie's 2017 output.

pewdiepie memes catchphrase memes misspelling memes slang memes youtube culture memes

Overview

Wamen is a joke mispronunciation of "women," built on the drawn-out vowel PewDiePie used while reading Respect Women image macros aloud in a June 2017 video1. Fans latched onto the delivery, and the spelling "wamen" turned into shorthand for mocking the sanctimonious tone of the original macros, usually paired with "respect wamen" as the full catchphrase2.

The joke works because it sounds earnest and clueless at the same time. Urban Dictionary contributors described wamen as "a rare species of women that usually needs more attention/respect," leaning into the parody of over-the-top chivalry that the Respect Women format already traded on3. In practice, the word started showing up in PewDiePie's own videos, in fan supercuts, and in reaction comics posted to his subreddit4.

Origin & Background

Platform
YouTube
Creator
PewDiePie
Date
2017

On June 2nd, 2017, PewDiePie uploaded "How to: Respect Women!" to his YouTube channel, a video walking through examples of the Respect Women image macro series1. His pronunciation of "women" during the clip, closer to "wamen," became the running bit that fans fixated on, and the video pulled roughly 4.5 million views and 36,400 comments within two months2.

The word jumped from a quirk in the video to a standalone catchphrase after fans isolated the moment. The earliest known meme packaging came from YouTuber Mr poopoo pants Whoisaryan, who posted a supercut titled "Respect Wamen" on June 18th, 20175.

How It Spread

The supercut on June 18th gave the joke a short, shareable artifact that was easier to pass around than the full PewDiePie episode5. Within weeks the spelling had spread far enough that on July 3rd, Urban Dictionary user GovermentReptilian submitted an entry defining wamen as "a rare species of women that usually needs more attention/respect"3.

It kept moving through PewDiePie's fan spaces in early July. On July 7th, Redditor boi267 posted a Your Mother and I Will Always Love You comic to r/PewdiepieSubmissions in which PewDiePie abandons a baby for saying "i disrespect wamen"2. PewDiePie leaned back into the bit on July 10th in his "Never Say This to a Gamer" video, where he dropped the wamen line several times4.

YouTube remixers kept the gag alive through mid-July. On July 13th, Day by Dave uploaded a music remix built from PewDiePie's original Respect Women episode, pulling more than 162,000 views and 840 comments within three weeks6.

Timeline

2017-06-02

PewDiePie uploads "How to: Respect Women!" to YouTube, the video where his "wamen" pronunciation originates.

2017-06-18

YouTuber Mr poopoo pants Whoisaryan posts a supercut titled "Respect Wamen," isolating the catchphrase.

2017-07-03

Urban Dictionary user GovermentReptilian submits a definition for "wamen."

2017-07-07

Redditor boi267 posts a Your Mother and I Will Always Love You comic to r/PewdiepieSubmissions riffing on the catchphrase.

2017-07-10

PewDiePie uploads "Never Say This to a Gamer," repeating the wamen line throughout.

2017-07-13

YouTuber Day by Dave uploads a music remix of the original Respect Women episode.

Frequently Asked Questions