FAFO
acronym
| FAFF-oh
an expression of warning or schadenfreude
What does FAFO mean?
FAFO is an acronym that stands for “F*** Around, Find Out” (or more politely “Fool Around, Find Out”).
Examples of FAFO
Since a lot of them voted for the dude screwing them over do not expect empathy from me. FAFO.
—@denisonscience, Blue Sky, 14 Feb. 2025
The National Weather Service is part of those cuts as it is part of NOAA. I recently read one meteorologist describe the cuts as not cutting fat or waste in the agency, but cutting bone. “These cuts will make it harder to keep your family safe when skies turn threatening. Hype? Wait for it. This isn’t efficiency. It’s insanity. A potentially deadly edition of FAFO.” That's what Paul Douglas, a Minnesota-based meteorologist recently posted on X (formerly Twitter).
—Throwback: The iconic scene [from Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing] when Sal’s pizzeria got rekt after he FAFO’d
—
Where does FAFO come from?
The origins of FAFO are debated, with some online commenters suggesting that it arose from motorcycle gang culture, from parodies of the Gadsden flag, or as the slogan of the Proud Boys, a neofascist, white nationalist organization. It seems to have first been used online in the late 2010s before becoming more widely adopted in the early 2020s.
How is FAFO used?
Despite its adoption as a slogan by far-right groups, it is also used widely by people across the ideological spectrum, often as an expression of schadenfreude when someone (or multiple people) receive negative consequences for doing something that the user feels they shouldn’t have. It’s somewhat of a pithier version of another popular online admonition: “play stupid games, win stupid prizes.” FAFO is used as an adjective (“a FAFO moment”), a verb, a noun, and interjection, and as a hashtag.
FAFO stands for "Fool Around and Find Out" (sort of. Adjust the spelling of that first word, and you’ll have it). … If you tell a child to put on his jacket before going outside, but he doesn’t want to, what do you do? Force him to wear it? Reward him for putting it on? Bend down and explain why mummy knows best? FAFO parenting says: “Fine, don’t put it on, but you’ll freeze.” Then let him freeze. Eventually, he’ll swallow his pride and come back to get his jacket.
—Patterson said the workers threatened and intimidated the driver of the truck, saying workers said “they would slash the truck” if it left the site with the equipment on Monday. He said that a police report has been filed and that the company is receiving email threats warning them “FAFO,” a term that means “f---around and find out.”
—
