Need some motivation to stay home, or help convincing your loved ones to do the same during the coronavirus outbreak?
Look no further than newly-minted meme queen Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot.
Lightfoot posted a video on social media Monday showing several different "versions" of herself spreading the message that everyone needs to, as she repeats multiple times, "Stay home. Save lives."
"Thinking about sneaking out to the lakefront or 606? Think again, Chicago!" she captioned the video on Facebook, encouraging residents to follow Gov. J.B. Pritzker's stay-at-home order closing all non-essential businesses and limiting outside travel.
First, Lightfoot appears as "the analyst," telling the camera, "The data shows that social distancing works. Please pay attention."
Then Lightfoot "the baker" appears, writing "Stay home!" in flour. "The baller" bargains with viewers that if she can make a shot into the basketball hoop on her refrigerator, they have to stay home, before slow-motion dunking the ball.
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"The voice of reason" tells a Debbie that getting her roots done "is not essential" and that her dog "doesn't need to see its friends."
Lightfoot "the astrologer" has a message for all whose birthdays have come and gone during the pandemic.
"Apologies to all the Aries, but if you stay at home now, maybe you can celebrate with the Geminis later," she says, sipping her tea.
Lightfoot shows off her singing voice and guitar skills as "the beginner," and tells her daughter Vivian she's "not bored" but "saving lives."
"The real friend" shuts down a pal's thoughts of getting a pedicure, "the decorator" fluffs pillows and "the fan" has another wager: if her White Sox win, "you gotta stay home," of course, rolling footage of the South Siders' World Series victory.
Last comes Lightfoot "the realist" with a foreboding message.
"The truth is 40,000 hospitalizations will break our health care system," she says. "Stay home. Save lives."
Lightfoot's message has been shared on Facebook and Twitter both thousands of times apiece. The video was posted just hours after Lightfoot acknowledged that yes, she had seen - and loved - the memes floating around showing her looking stern at shut down parts of the city.
Lori Lightfoot Memes Are the Laugh We All Needed Right Now
"We've been having fun with it, my wife and my daughter and I," Lightfoot reiterated at a news conference Tuesday. "This is a really intense situation and we all need to find the humor. From humor stems hope."
"I know from my experiences over my life that when you have hope, you can heal," she continued. "Hope is the thing that gets you up in the morning and propels you over the course of the day and we need that hope, we need to have that sense that even in this dark storm there's light."
"The overwhelming response [to the video] that we've received, like with the response to the memes, means to me that people are hungry for something to hang onto, something that will take their mind off of the stress and fear that I think people are legitimately feeling in this time like no other in our lifetime," Lightfoot added.
