I have a long-standing disdain for the use of memes in political discourse. This is because what memes create isn’t discourse. Rather, they exist as flags which are stuck in the ground–and around them those who rally to the flag get to flip the bird at all detractors. I have no time for such things ¹.

With the approach of the 2020 presidential election, however, the memes are out in full force–none of which I will show or mention here, as I don’t want folks to give these things more pings than they already get. The reality is, they are propaganda in the worst sense of the word–filled with lies or half-truths meant to stoke the fear and anger needed to “rally the base.” Giving in to a meme’s propaganda is actually submitting to gross manipulation, often while believing we’re showing “them.” It’s insidious ².

We need to break this cycle, so I have created my own meme ³. Why would I do this? Because poking our brains through our own eye sockets is about the best description I can use for how I feel about meme propaganda.

Can we please just stop?