simplified Chinese: 发疯文学; pinyin: Fāfēng wénxué

Insanity Philosophy

发疯文学 (Fāfēng wénxué) can be directly translated as Insane or Insanity Philosophy. It was initially an online term to describe a way to express one’s emotions by “crazily” expressing using words. For instance, posting something on a platform such as Weibo, Instagram, or Twitter and giving the captions an aggressive tone to express the frustration of the original creator. The origin of this philosophy came from a customer who was negotiating with an online service desk. After many failed attempts to get through, the customer sent a long rant on how they could not fall asleep after communicating with the service desk and how they were getting angrier by the minute as they thought about the situation. The rant was sent with randomly placed punctuation as well, giving the reader a feeling of actually wanting to go crazy after reading it. After this example was popularized on the Internet, many people decided to try it as a last result to get the result they wanted and concluded that this strategy really worked. Many versions and varieties of fa feng wen xue can be utilized in different situations. One is just to act crazy or burnt out to express oneself. For example, “I am really done. I feel like I am going insane. I am angry when bathing, going out, walking, and eating. I feel as if I have been cursed. There is so much happiness in the world. Why can’t I feel it?…” Another example is when browsing social media and friends circles, “What is this that you post daily? I used to like looking at your stories, but now, nothing is interesting. What do you want to express by posting all of this? Don’t post this again in the future. You know what I like to see.” Or utilizing a well-known character. For example, Lin Daiyu, from one of the four classics, Dream of the Red Chamber, or the Monkey King from Journey to the West. The famous line “烦死了” (“so annoying”) is often used to express frustration. This philosophy has now extended beyond its original written use to the actions of many people when they are fed up with a situation. For example, a popular video, now a meme, is of two elderly village women fighting and both pointing and yelling at each other to back up. This action is now widely spread and used when someone does not want others to come near them. Another example is when girls or younger females are harassed in public, for instance, when out alone or with a friend, and someone asks them if they are by themselves, a response given by many is “No, I just got out,” meaning that they just got released from prison. This usually stops the harasser, and they get left alone. Many times, being insane and using the insanity philosophy allows the job to get done without having to jump through many of the extra hoops that some might have when faced with a “normal” person.

Work cited:

“发疯文学.” 百度百科, baike.baidu.com/item/%E5%8F%91%E7%96%AF%E6%96%87%E5%AD%A6/59181255. Accessed 4 Dec. 2023.