You weren't involved on early forums if you think that shitposting and cheap memes haven't made their way into every social media platform ever. Shitposting is like the default human behavior. The wonder of the forum-style platform is the ability to isolate shitposting to select communities and harbor different types of deeper conversations within other communities. The people gotta have their shitposts somewhere. Best to create a mud pile for them to roll around in.