Meme with angry emoji and fire background reading 'i am u/fireguy12, u/waterguy12 isn't here to save you, upvote this post or I will set r/me_irl ablaze!'

Waterguy12

2017eventclassic

Published August 10, 2026

Waterguy12 is the Reddit username of a user who kicked off a two-week r/me_irl tagging saga in July 2017 by asking the subreddit to tag him on good memes while he was without WiFi. The bit snowballed into a mock war with an account called FireGuy12 and got a smaller sequel in June 2019.

subreddit origin memes reddit memes accidental fame memes 2017 memes collaborative fiction memes

Overview

Waterguy12 is the Reddit username of a user who accidentally spawned one of r/me_irl's most-remembered sagas in the summer of 20171. Before leaving for two weeks without internet, he asked the subreddit to tag him in any good memes so he wouldn't miss out1. The tag flood that followed pulled in a rival account called FireGuy12 and turned into a mock war fought with water and fire emojis3.

The bit is remembered less for a single image and more as a community in-jokes event, where users spun up dozens of accounts following a "SomethingGuy12" naming pattern to pick sides in the fake fight3. A second departure in June 2019 kicked off a smaller sequel round of the same tagging bit1.

Origin & Background

Platform
Reddit (r/me_irl)
Creator
Waterguy12
Date
2017

On July 29th, 2017, Waterguy12 posted to r/me_irl announcing he was heading somewhere without WiFi until August 14th and jokingly asked people to tag him on good memes so he wouldn't miss out1. Within six days the post picked up over 9,000 upvotes and users started dropping "u/waterguy12" in the comments of nearly every submission1. By August 5th the tagging had gotten so out of hand that Redditor martinber123 wrote an r/OutOfTheLoop thread titled "Why is everyone tagging u/waterguy12 in every comment"2.

How It Spread

On August 4th, 2017, an account called FireGuy12 appeared on r/me_irl and threatened to set the sub ablaze unless users upvoted him, pulling in over 11,000 upvotes overnight3. Copycat accounts using the "SomethingGuy12" naming pattern flooded in and users picked sides. When Waterguy12 finally returned on August 14th, his re-entry post about reading responses on a train pulled in roughly 59,000 votes in six hours and left him with 3,200+ notifications that kept glitching1.

He then redirected the r/waterguy12 subreddit to raid r/fireguy12 with images of water, hauling in another 33,000 upvotes4. FireGuy12 begged for a truce "for their old friend Fernando" and Waterguy12 agreed, ending the fight1. On June 28th, 2019, Waterguy12 announced a second trip from June 30th to July 15th, gathering 52,600+ upvotes in three days and prompting a wave of nostalgic me_irl posts tagging his username across older meme threads1.

How to Use This Meme

The convention is to reply to a strong meme on r/me_irl by tagging /u/waterguy12 in the comments, often paired with water emojis or a jab at FireGuy121. Newer versions of the joke typically frame the tag as 'saving' a meme for someone who is offline, then get answered by other users tagging back with the SomethingGuy12 format3.

Frequently Asked Questions