According to its designer, Comic Sans was "designed for screen use (that is why there wasn’t any kerning) in applications targeted to new computer users and families with children".
Basically, it was made for children, attempting to seem friendly and familiar by emulating the look of hand-lettered comic book speech bubbles. The reason some people (especially those of us with design degrees) dislike it is because it is used in inappropriate contexts all the time. For example, Comic Sans wasn't the most appropriate choice for the CERN presentation announcing the Higgs Boson. It doesn't say "we are serious scientists," it says, "we are children."
Do I hate Comic Sans? No. Do I think it's a good font? No. Even on the rare occasion when I need a font that looks hand lettered, it's usually just best to go ahead and letter by hand. When time constraints make that impossible, there are many better "comic" style fonts out there than Comic Sans. It's just sort of ugly. The kerning is awful. Also, it's impossible to look at it in a vacuum at this point. It's basically become a joke in design world (and as OP point out, almost a meme of sorts), so most designers are never going to use it.
"Hating" it is silly though. It's just a bad typeface, it's not ruining anyone's life.
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