The 'Why Can't You Just Be Normal' meme originates from a high-tension scene in the 2014 Australian psychological horror film 'The Babadook.' In the movie, the exhausted protagonist Amelia, pushed to her breaking point by her son Samuel's erratic behavior, screams the titular question while they are in the car. Samuel responds with an equally intense shriek. The scene's raw portrayal of exasperation resonated with the internet, surfacing as a viral reaction image on Tumblr and Reddit around 2016. It is now widely used to mock weird behavior, eccentric subcultures, or annoying software updates that refuse to function simply.