Historical Events  Movies
Tarzan and Jane

Alternate:
"Me Tarzan, You Jane" was in the original Tarzan movies

Current:
"Me Tarzan, You Jane" was not in the original Tarzan movies

You Jane Me Tarzan

Another popular misquote or the Mass Memory Discrepancy Effect in action?

The favourite schoolyard call "Me Tarzan, You Jane!" can't be found in any of the original Tarzan movies, nor in the books running right back to when he first appeared in "Tarzan of the Apes" in 1912. Yet this quote is as famous as the other "non-quote" people remember, "Beam me up Scotty". What is causing people to not only think they were present originally, but continue repeating them?

Once a phrase such as this, which almost seems trying to sum up the entire movie or series in one quick phrase, gets into the public consciousness, its appears for some of them there is no stopping them once they hit a critical point. They become a "meme" and gain a life of their own. It's as if the masses, who aren't hardcore fans, use it as this quick "summary" to the chagrin of that fewer group who actually to pay attention and realise their "mistake".

Viscount Greystoke

The character was created by Edgar Rice Burroughs, in a 1912 magazine publication Tarzan of the Apes, which was published as a book in 1914. The movies portray the character as very different to the original story, because whilst both were raised by apes, in the novel he was the son of a family of British nobility and spoke eloquently, whereas in the movies he speaks a much simpler way. It's revealed that Tarzan is his ape name, in reality he was called John Clayton.

The phrase "Me, Tarzan, You Jane" is one of those condensed snippet type Mandela Effect examples, where an effective "trigger" is used to summarise the whole work, and it's not actually relevant whether it was really used in the original or not.