I married into a Jewish family, and let me tell you, "Jewish guilt" is a very real thing. At this point, the joke in the family is that I'm totally immune to Jewish guilt.

Uuuuuuuhhhh.......


If you're feeling guilty because someone's poking fun at what we consider to be problems in our own society, then I don't know what to do for you.

My friends and I say it a lot, and usually immediately after our own complaints about something. It's meant in jest. Not to invalidate what someone said, but to try and alleviate with humor.

I mean, the idea that someone's saying it to guilt you is.....well that's just Catholic, I guess. All power to you and your anger over someone trying to lighten the mood, I suppose. Fight that fight, right to fight-town?

My family is Irish Catholic, the other part is Portuguese anarchists and scary Indianas that were members of (no joke) the Blood Tribe...thankfully I take after my father.

Context matters. Usually when I hear it, it is in a smug context, of which I'm not a fan. YMMV.

That would not rankle me in the slightest.

Unless they are.

Unless they aren't.

Uhhhh.....


It's not a guilt thing. Its unoriginal and unfunny on any level. We've spent the last 3 post saying how were' not guilted one iota by it. The intent of many people is to guilt others into quit #####ing. It's not poking fun its stupid...much like actually poking someone is.

Also lightening the mood? Someone complaining about work isn't making it dark...you bringing up genocide, starvation and corruption is not lightening mode...its categorically the opposite of keeping it light.

This isn't a guilt thing and especially not an anger over the issues in the 3rd world thing. It's an originality thing, I have the same reaction to Git 'R' Done.

If you're gonna use sad stuff as a sounding board for humor don't half-### it by saying something that someone's aunt probably says on a regular basis.

Sounds like context doesn't matter to some, though, which is my point:

So, let me just make sure I understand this right:

If I complain about how the store across the street doesn't have my favorite soda in stock today, and then after a bit say, "First World Problems", I am some sort of #######, because it conjures up images of awful bad things, and because you don't consider it to be original? Or is it just because it's not original?

While I feel for you about the stress situation, as I'm in the same situation as well, the whole meaning behind "First World Problems" is that people here in the United States complain about the most mundane things that most take for granted. For example, the person getting .8 mps download speed is complaining that it takes 5 seconds to load a website. My brother can't get internet service faster than dial-up where he lives.

It's how a person might go on a rant because the local 7 11 is out of Cherry Slurpee, or that their iPhone battery died before they could get home to the charger. Basically, it calls out people's petty problems that aren't really big issues.

Very true. I work in customer service at a grocery store. When I first started it took me a while to learn where everything was located. Anyway I had a customer ask me where to find canned mushrooms and I told him I didn't know because I just started working there, I also stated that I could ask someone else for him. He replied "No I will find someone smart on my own" So I said "Did you just call me stupid for not knowing where the canned mushrooms are?" He said "yes." so I replied "You don't know where they are either." and then I walked away. So the customer is always right; I'm stupid but so is he.

Also any help Here Would be appreciated!

Start telling people that its "fourth world problems". If they give you a look, tell them "Mars-specific."

It's like yesterday morning I was complaining about how I couldn't log into Facebook. It's something that we should be glad that we can complain about when there's people out there who don't even know what Facebook is. So first world problems is sort of like meh, I really shouldn't be complaining so much about this when there are people out there who have it worst so it just isn't really that big of a deal.

The issue I see is that you're drawing attention to it. We all have problems, but when you joke "1st world" problems, it sounds like you don't have an appreciation for 3rd world problems at all. Maybe you don't, not my place to conjecture. But doing that in jest shows a lack of true understanding or compassion for 3rd world people.

It's the same line of thinking that school children use when mocking the retarded or disabled students. Who are you to mock them, directly or indirectly, for a crappy situation they had no control over and are still trying to make the best of?

Does anybody else have a terrible temptation to respond to complaints about the overuse of the phrase "first world problems" with . . . "first world problems?"

I don't think that's an appropriate analogy. The "1st world problems" joke doesn't mock those in the third world, it mocks those in the first world.

I like using "That's what she said" when someone says something that a female already said. Totally catches them off guard.