One of the moderators running r/OddlyAccurateInsults, William, was kind enough to answer Bored Panda’s questions about the subreddit. He also shared his take on the secret to a good insult, and what to do if someone’s roasting you.

The redditor said that he’s not the actual creator of the subreddit, however, he was one of the first mods who started managing the community.

“I believe there is a niche for those insults that just hit and are a little too accurate for comfort,” he told us about the inspiration behind r/OddlyAccurateInsults.

“Having that niche for a subreddit seemed like a great idea to me and the creator which caused the spark of our little community.”

We were curious to get the mod’s opinion on what the key to a powerful insult is. Being specific is important, according to him, but mixing things up is also a valid approach. “I believe the secret to a good insult is using something relevant to the situation,” he shared with Bored Panda.

“However, you can do the complete opposite and sometimes it works out. It really feels like a hit or miss which makes it all the more entertaining to see unfold.”

Meanwhile, we know for a fact that we’d feel pretty lost if we were hit with an oddly accurate insult. Bored Panda asked the moderator on how best to react to a stinging insult. Laughter is a wonderful way to neutralize any negative feelings you might have.

“When it comes to reacting, I just laugh. I’m not a very serious guy and I try to find the humor in everything I can,” William shared. “So if somebody insults me bad, I’ll just tell ‘em it was a nice burn and move on with my life. No need getting caught up in a stranger making fun of me.”

The r/OddlyAccurateInsults subreddit was created back in October 2019. At the time of writing, the group had just over 2.2k members. And even though the screenshots and pics they post are great, the group itself isn’t as active as it once was. However, the founders point out that the sub itself is an ‘offbrand’ version of r/rareinsults, a massively popular community that is hard to ignore on Reddit.

Over the course of the last 5+ years, r/rareinsults has grown to over 2.3 million members who love sharing unique insults and ‘spicing up their vocabulary.’ 

Previously, Bored Panda spoke to one of the moderators running r/rareinsults, u/Blank-Cheque, and they told us about the group’s history and why it is that human beings curse and swear so much.

“The community was originally founded by Gorangeninja, after he saw someone suggest it be made on another subreddit. The subreddit only grew to a few thousand users in the span of about 8 months. Our current top mod, Remydesp, was an active user in the subreddit in its first few months, and a lack of moderation plagued the subreddit, so he reached out to the mods offering to help out in the task of moderation,” they said.

“Over the course of the next year, Gorangeninja stepped down as top mod, and Remydesp and our former owner Tycoinator added many other mods to help out. The biggest challenge in getting a large following was maintaining the quality of the content on the subreddit. In the next 3 months, the subreddit grew almost 200k users, and the influx of new users brought along a lot of low-quality posts. The support from the amazing moderation team has allowed the subreddit to thrive and still maintain the original quality. After Pewdiepie made a video on our subreddit, we grew almost 25k users in one day. If the subreddit did not have such hardworking and committed moderators, we would not have seen the success we have today,” u/Blank-Cheque spoke to us about r/rareinsults back in 2019.

According to u/Blank-Cheque, science, not philosophy helps explain why people curse and swear. “Cursing has been observed by scientists to alleviate pain, and insult-like gestures have been observed by researchers even in chimpanzees,” they told Bored Panda.

“Professor Frans de Waal said that angry chimpanzees ‘will grunt or spit or make an abrupt, upsweeping gesture that, if a human were to do it, you'd recognize it as aggressive’ in order to avoid conflict, rather than to escalate it. He continues that a ‘chimpanzee who is really gearing up for a fight doesn't waste time with gestures, but just goes ahead and attacks.’ [Insults] are a part of life, and a world without them would be extremely different to ours to a degree which cannot be simply explained,” the r/rareinsults mod said, adding that in real-life they try to avoid hurling insults at anyone because it’s rude.

Recently, British comedy writer Ariane Sherine told Bored Panda that the key to creative and stylish insults is subtlety. It’s essential to find the right balance between humor and meanness. One way that you can do so is to "appear to be sweet then switch to barbed humor."

On the flip side, if you wanted to give someone a compliment instead of insulting them, try to be as specific as possible. "Instead of just saying 'I like your dress,' which anyone can do, go into detail and talk about the pattern or the fabric. Similarly, if you're complimenting someone's character, instead of saying 'you're so kind,' give an example of why or when they were kind. Backing it up with examples and evidence shows that it isn't just a hollow compliment," the comedy expert said.