Social networks and media hosting sites have recently fostered a growing trend in meme culture: the circulation of images within strangely specific categories of pleasure such as the “oddly satisfying” and the “mildly interesting.” Difficult to define but collectively recognized, what I call aesthetic category memes are made up of images of ordinary things and processes that not only exemplify such categories of pleasure, but also provoke reflection on the peculiar nature of those categories. As a result, I argue, contributors to aesthetic category memes are unwittingly engaged in a philosophical project that tests the principles of aesthetic theory. Examining the growing archive of images and comments alongside key texts in aesthetic theory, I explore how aesthetic category memes reclaim the aesthetic faculties away from the presumed passivity of sharing, consuming, and “liking” online content, thereby revealing the philosophical foundations of what it means to share and “like” at all.
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