The anonymity of the Internet enabled users to express far right or far left opinions without being stigmatized. These early discussions and memes failed to result in a single political movement, because, unlike the political memes during the World Wars, they not speak with a united voice. The political discussion on these forums, and the creation of political memes to accompany discussion, was uncoordinated and lacked cohesion. The forums used English as their working language, but easily attracted international readers and subscribers. 4chan also became a place for debates, transforming from a purely image-based platform into an image and text-based forum. Forums like “Reddit” began to spring up, allowing for multiple debates on a single topic. However, the Internet’s anonymity made it an attractive forum for political debate. Early Internet memes that gained popularity were not political in nature. Unlike its evolutionary origins, the memes here were deliberately adapted by people and were passed on to others, who adapted them further. One of them was “4chan”, which started as an image sharing site for the fans to discuss Japanese anime cartoons. However, the creation of the Internet enabled ordinary people to not only produce their own images but spread them by uploading them onto popular sharing platforms. All the examples shown below follow the same basic template – images and words are aimed at stimulating nationalism and action and may be considered early examples of political memes.ĭuring the 20 th century, only governments had the resources to ensure these images could reach people across the country, which enabled the government to maintain a monopoly on early political meme creation. Similar images were adopted, adapted and spread through other countries, including the Soviet Union. Later James Montgomery Flagg adapted the British Lord Kitchener into the American Uncle Sam and created the iconic “ I Want You” recruitment poster for the US Army in 1918. The powerful patriotic image and call to action turned out to be incredibly appealing and effective. The poster was created by the British Parliamentary Recruiting Committee in September 1914. An early example of a popular “political meme” is the “Britons, Lord Kitchener Wants You” recruitment image for the British Army during World War One (displayed below). Early on, governments found that taking symbols and images, then adapting and spreading them, could yield politically positive results. Memes were used to understand why some behaviors that seemed to make no sense evolutionarily, were easily adopted and spread within society.Ī powerful concept of mass imitation and repetition is appealing to governments, who used “memes” for political purposes. In his 1976 bestseller, The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins coined the term “meme” to talk about an idea, behavior, or style that spreads from one person to another within a culture. The term “meme” was adopted from evolutionary biology. These memes might be a way to express the values of the Internet community, create its own language and document its significant symbols, rituals, moments, etc. Usually, it has catchy content and layout, is reposted by users and goes viral on the Internet. Since there are several standard definitions of “meme”, hereinafter the following is applied:Ī meme is a message in new media, which represents the reaction to political events and changes. Though the meme was initially a product of the entertainment industry, today this phenomenon is widely used in political communication. They are everywhere: starting with social media to newspapers headlines, from business to politics. Even today, memes have become so commonplace that it seems they have always been present in our life. There will come a time when grandparents will tell their grandchildren stories of what politics were like without memes.
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