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She attributes the weirdness of these WWIII memes to the abstract ways their creators are talking about war: “I have a hard time empathizing with the whole ‘Millennials are tired of living through historical events’ narrative when most people are not, in fact, living through it but watching it happen to others from the safety of their couch.”īetween her Russian and Ukrainian friends, she admits that memes have been passed around “to share a smirk,” but overall they don’t “give us any hope or relief at the moment.” Memes prove limited in their ability to help people cope in situations like these. She was born in Russia (where she still has family) and is in regular contact with friends in Russia and Ukraine. I follow her TikTok for her pickle reviews. Vlasta Pilot is a Los Angeles–based artist and TikTok creator. “While it does feel large and overwhelming, as an elder millennial, I just feel at a loss to do anything let alone process through memes.” Brennan noticed that this time the people making and sharing these viral memes are not the people at the center of the conflict. I have a hard time empathizing with the whole ‘Millennials are tired of living through historical events’ narrative when most people are not, in fact, living through it.īut this round of WWIII memes feels different.Īs a meme librarian who’s worked for Instagram and Tumblr, Amanda Brennan’s job is to decipher the mass of popular memes for whatever sense, story, or meaning she can make of them: “Seeing some of these memes feels so haunting because it feels more like the gravity of the uprisings is different than the fake WWIII memes that trended throughout 2020.” The war we theorized about 2020 did not exactly materialize the one in these recent memes, in a way, has. Meme culture under the Trump administration was definitely dark and maybe even self-indulgent and fatalistic. That March, we dipped our toes into coronavirus memes as we adjusted for the change and began to cope with the losses. It was Americans under Trump making memes about Trump’s America, an unsafe reality we were actively navigating - or trying to, at least. It was mostly a meme about Trump, about his political bravado and cartoonish antics. The memes jumped to the WWIII conclusion because those are, historically, the kind of assassinations that prompt world wars (remember Archduke Ferdinand from history class?). In January 2020, “ #ww3” memes followed then-President Trump’s admission that he’d ordered the assassination of a high-ranking Iranian official. They are not, if you can believe it, the first World War III memes to go viral. Instead, it’s flooding our feeds with half-baked thoughts and needy “Look at me!” performances that make demands on our attention and create so much noise (perhaps an accurate externalization of what’s going on in some minds).Ĭonsider the history of these particular memes.
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In this particular case, it doesn’t seem to facilitate connection and learning let alone make any tangible impact.
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Just reposting a meme about current events says “I read the news, I’m a good person, but I don’t know what to say or do, LOL.” The problem with this offering is it’s three I statements in a row. Like, say, anxiety over escalating imperial aggression. We also share memes as shorthand for things we feel we don’t have the right words to express. Memes are woven into our language and culture, and they’re ridiculously good at packaging information and projecting it across the internet at uncanny speeds. This kind of online behavior treats memes as social currency - things to post to get attention, to fit in, or to make public statements about who we are. They’re on every social-media platform, and everyone - from celebrities to the very online - feels compelled to chime in through retweets, reshares, screenshots, and attempted dunks. Tweets about surviving a (still ongoing) pandemic only to be “rewarded” with war. The official Ukraine Twitter account posted a literal meme. Others I’ve seen in the past few days include dozens of memes about drafted Americans doing silly things on foreign soil. As Russian forces began their invasion of Ukraine last week, our news feeds began to show us - in addition to plenty of misinformation, legit harrowing footage from on-the-ground war reporters, and whatever this is - memes about World War III. That John Cena tweet about his show Peacemaker. You’ve seen them: the one where the Wordle is “peace. Photo-Illustration: Photo-Illustration: The Cut Photos: Getty Images