No previous armed conflict of such proportions on the European continent took place in an era of such quick and easy access to information. The war between Russia and Ukraine, decreed at dawn this Thursday (24), is also taking place in digital territory.
With more than 730,000 followers, the official Ukrainian government account on Twitter has been adopting an unusual strategy of using social networks for a country being invaded: memes as political propaganda.
As Russian troops advance on Ukrainian territories and civilians are bombed, the profile published a cartoon depicting Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler affectionately holding Vladimir Putin’s face while smiling.
“This is not a meme, but yours and our reality at the moment,” added the profile. @Ukraine. It is the most serious military crisis in Europe since World War II, and the biggest such operation since the United States invaded Iraq in 2003.
The publication went viral, with more than a million likes and more than a hundred thousand comments. “I can’t believe I’m witnessing an image that will go down in the history books,” said user @NationOfEagles.
The page later encouraged followers to bookmark Russia’s official profile and “say what you think of them”. And he asked Twitter to remove the neighboring country’s account from the platform. “There is no place for bullies like Russia on western social media platforms,” ​​the tweet reads.
This is not the first time that @Ukraine has adopted this combative strategy against Russia on social media. In December 2021, amid the preamble that would lead to the country’s invasion, the account shared a meme about “types of headache”. In the image, there is an indication that being Russia’s neighbor would be the worst kind.
In June 2020, he shared with the caption “former toxic here” a post from Russia’s profile with memories of “the good old days” when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union.
The strategy is to create viral content that makes the country’s geopolitical positioning reach more people and its political message is conveyed through good humor.
To The Washington Post, the person responsible for the page (who did not want to be identified) defined @Ukraine’s position as: “Imagine a very good person who went through a lot in the past, managed to overcome difficulties and developed this kind of humor. dark and cheeky as a defense. That’s what the Ukraine account is about. We laugh at threats, not because we underestimate them, but because what else could we do? Lie down and cry? Tears never guaranteed freedom.” The memes, at least, get attention.
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