You've heard it. Probably in a dark comedy, a cartoon, or maybe at a particularly rowdy office party where someone finally stayed out late enough to be "initiated" into the group. The one of us one of us chant is a rhythmic, hypnotic drone that feels like it’s been around since the dawn of time. It’s creepy. It’s weirdly welcoming. Honestly, it’s one of those things that most people use without actually knowing where it came from, which is kind of the point of a true meme.
It didn't start on TikTok. It didn't start on Reddit.
To find the actual source, you have to go back to 1932. Specifically, you have to look at Tod Browning’s film Freaks. If you haven't seen it, it’s a trip. Browning was the guy who directed the original Dracula with Bela Lugosi, so he had some serious weight in Hollywood. But Freaks was different. Instead of using makeup and prosthetics, Browning cast real-life circus sideshow performers—people with actual physical deformities and unique conditions.
The plot is basically a revenge story. A beautiful trapeze artist named Cleopatra decides to marry Hans, a performer with dwarfism, but only because she wants his inheritance. She plans to poison him. During the wedding feast, the other performers—the "freaks"—decide to accept her into their closed-knit community. They start the chant.
"Gooble, gobble, we accept her, we accept her! Gooble, gobble, one of us, one of us!"
It wasn't meant to be funny back then. It was unsettling. It was a declaration of kinship that Cleopatra found repulsive, which eventually leads to the film's famously gruesome ending where the performers turn her into one of them—literally.
The Chant That Refused to Die
Hollywood actually hated the movie. It was banned in the UK for thirty years. People walked out of screenings. It almost ruined Browning's career. But then, the 1960s happened. The counterculture movement rediscovered Freaks at midnight screenings and film festivals. Suddenly, being an "outsider" or a "freak" was a badge of honor. The one of us one of us chant morphed from a terrifying threat of assimilation into a celebratory anthem for anyone who didn't fit the "normie" mold.
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The chant is short. It’s punchy.
It works because it taps into a very primal human fear: the loss of individuality. When a group looks at you and says "you are one of us," they are stripping away your "you-ness." They are absorbing you. It’s the Borg before the Borg existed. Yet, paradoxically, we all want to belong. We crave the safety of the pack. That tension is why the chant is still used in everything from The Simpsons to South Park and The Wolf of Wall Street.
In The Simpsons, specifically the "Homer the Great" episode involving the Stonecutters, the show parodies the ritualistic nature of secret societies. When Homer is accepted, the absurdity of the chant highlights how silly our desire for exclusive club membership really is. It’s a joke about us.
Why It Sticks in Your Brain
There’s a linguistic reason why the one of us one of us chant works so well. It’s an anaphora—a repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive clauses. But more than that, it’s a spondee in poetic terms, or close to it. The stresses are heavy. ONE of US. ONE of US. It mimics a heartbeat. Or a drum.
It’s easy to do. You don't need a melody. You just need a pulse.
Look at how it was used in The Wolf of Wall Street. Jordan Belfort’s firm is a den of "freaks" in their own right—outcasts who found a way to scam the system. When they chant, it’s not about welcoming someone into a family; it’s about welcoming them into a cult of greed. The context changes, but the feeling remains. It signals that the person being chanted at has crossed a line. There is no going back. You’ve been baptized in the collective.
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The Modern Meme Evolution
Nowadays, the chant has been stripped of its 1930s horror roots for most people. If you’re in a gaming lobby and you pull off a particularly "gamer" move, someone might type it in the chat. It’s shorthand for: "You’re just as weird/obsessed/skilled as we are."
It’s become a "semantic bleach" situation. That’s a term linguists use when a word or phrase loses its original, intense meaning through over-use and becomes a general-purpose tool.
But even as a meme, it carries a hint of the uncanny. Have you ever noticed that people usually do it when someone has done something slightly embarrassing? If you trip in public, your friends might not say it. But if you admit to a weird niche hobby—like collecting vintage staplers—that’s when the one of us one of us chant starts. It marks the moment a secret is revealed, and that secret makes you part of the tribe.
The Psychology of Group Acceptance
Social psychologists like Henri Tajfel have talked a lot about Social Identity Theory. Basically, we categorize the world into "us" and "them." The moment the chant starts, the "them" becomes "us." It’s an auditory bridge.
However, there’s a dark side.
In the original film, the chant was a precursor to a forced transformation. In real life, groupthink can be just as damaging. When we chant "one of us," we are often demanding conformity. We are saying, "Stop being different and start being like this." It’s a soft version of the "crabs in a bucket" mentality. If you try to climb out or be different, the group pulls you back in with a rhythmic reminder that you belong to the collective.
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Notable Appearances You Might Have Forgotten
- Ramones - "Pinhead": The legendary punk band literally used "Gabba Gabba Hey!" which is a direct riff on the "Gooble Gobble" part of the chant. They saw themselves as the "freaks" of the music world.
- Toy Story: Remember the aliens in the claw machine? "The Claaaaw." It’s the same energy. While they don't say the exact words, the rhythmic, unified speech pattern is a direct descendant of the Freaks style of chanting.
- I, Robot: The scene where the robots begin to unify and turn against their programming uses similar visual and auditory cues of mass assimilation.
Most people think these are just pop culture references, but they are actually keeping a 90-year-old piece of avant-garde horror alive. It’s pretty rare for a film that bombed so spectacularly in 1932 to have its dialogue become a staple of 21st-century digital communication.
How to Use the Chant Without Being Cringe
Look, if you’re going to use the one of us one of us chant in a social setting or online, context is everything. Because it’s so old and has been parodied so many times, it can feel a bit "fellow kids" if you force it.
It works best when:
- The person actually did something to earn it. Don't just say it to be nice. It’s for when someone reveals a shared obsession or a common "flaw."
- You keep the rhythm. It’s not a sentence; it’s a beat.
- You realize the irony. The best use of the chant today acknowledges that being "one of us" is a bit of a mixed bag. It’s a community, sure, but it’s a community of weirdos.
Honestly, the chant is probably going to outlive all of us. It’s survived the Hays Code, the death of vaudeville, the rise of the internet, and the shift from film to streaming. It’s a piece of linguistic DNA that perfectly captures the tension between being an individual and being part of a group.
If you want to dive deeper into where these weird cultural artifacts come from, your best bet is to actually watch the 1932 film Freaks. Just a heads up: it’s still uncomfortable to watch. It’s not a "fun" movie in the modern sense. It’s gritty, it’s controversial, and it treats its subjects with a mix of genuine empathy and voyeuristic horror that modern cinema still hasn't quite figured out how to replicate.
Actionable Insights for the Curious
- Watch the Source: Rent Freaks (1932). It’s only about 64 minutes long. Seeing the wedding feast scene provides a totally different perspective on the meme.
- Observe Group Dynamics: Next time you hear a group chant or use a repetitive phrase, notice how it changes the energy in the room. Does it feel inclusive or exclusionary?
- Research the Ramones: If you’re a music fan, look into the "Gabba Gabba Hey" history. It’s a great example of how a "scary" movie quote became a punk rock battle cry.
- Check Your Tropes: If you’re a writer or creator, use the chant sparingly. It’s a powerful trope for indicating a character has lost their autonomy or has finally found their "tribe," but it’s easily overdone.
The next time you find yourself joining in on a one of us one of us chant, remember Cleopatra and the wedding table. You aren't just saying a funny line from a cartoon. You’re participating in a century-old tradition of defining who belongs and who gets left out in the cold. It’s a little bit of movie magic that turned into a permanent part of how we talk to each other. Even if it is a little creepy. Maybe especially because it’s a little creepy.