this post was submitted on 18 Jul 2023
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The original meaning of the word as I first heard it back in the late 1990s was to refer to the vast majority of "normal" people who don't have an interest in or deep understanding of technology and internet culture.
I don't think it was originally meant as an insult, but more as an acknowledgement and reminder to ourselves that the things we were into and cared about were a niche thing and not exactly the norm.
Nowadays, I've heard it applied to just about any niche interest or hobby, for example: people who are not into mechanical keyboards would also be "normies", and worse it's being thrown around as a direct insult to people, in the same vein as calling someone "basic".
that's still my understanding of normie today. a normie nowadays is the average person who uses soulless platforms like tiktok, insta, etc which are controlled by big tech companies and exist for the sole purpose of making money. they don't know about the golden age of the internet when you cared about the content and not about likes. but now since the normies discovered the internet everything has to generate as much profit as possible
I would not agree that you two are saying the same thing.
I didn't know it dated back to the 90s, but I agree, the word has gotten mainstream and changed its meaning while doing so.
Actually even further than that, even back in the 80s it was apparently used in certain subcultures to distinguish (drug) "addicts" from "normal people".