Meme Wars Quotes

“While Andrew Breitbart used to say “Politics is downstream from culture,” our research into a decade of meme wars demonstrates that culture is downstream from infrastructure. From Occupy to the January 6 insurrection, the communication infrastructure adopted by insurgents, coupled with favorable social conditions maintained by political, news, and economic elites, has shaped how they reach new audiences42 and proliferate. Perhaps ironically, a fringe group’s ability to sway mainstream media and political agendas depends upon their ability to be noticed and amplified by the same institutions they revile.”
― Joan Donovan, Meme Wars: The Untold Story of the Online Battles Upending Democracy in America

“Despite what they had seen with their own eyes, for the GOP to condemn the people who had stormed the Capitol on January 6 as insurrectionists would be to condemn Trump, and the identity of their own base. They couldn’t risk distancing themselves from the red-pilled right, which had been schooled to line up behind Trump. Right-wing influencers and pundits had their work cut out for them in shaping a counternarrative, not only about the direction of the GOP but about objective political truth as well. Tucker Carlson rose to the challenge at the year anniversary mark with a three-part documentary series arguing that the insurrection had been a deep state trap to persecute conservatives. “The U.S. government has in fact launched a new war on terror,” he said. “But it’s not against Al Qaeda, it’s against American citizens.”
― Joan Donovan, Meme Wars: The Untold Story of the Online Battles Upending Democracy in America

“But it is undeniable that Trump harnessed and encouraged the antiestablishment energy found online, and that his status as president helped this energy move from the wires to the weeds. Stop the Steal, Trump’s last gamble, showed him ready to exploit the very people who had voted for him and who he surely knew were susceptible to his lies.”
― Joan Donovan, Meme Wars: The Untold Story of the Online Battles Upending Democracy in America

“The meme-ification of Black death29 was not new here. What was new was the means by which Black death through photos was digitized and distributed to new audiences, particularly ones who were not necessarily seeking it out.”
― Joan Donovan, Meme Wars: The Untold Story of the Online Battles Upending Democracy in America

“Clickbait ushered in an era of “fake news,” which led us to the disinformation age of the 2020s, where it’s so hard to tell truth from fact online that bad actors have figured out how to get what they want—be that money or power or something else—by spreading intentionally false information.”
― Joan Donovan, Meme Wars: The Untold Story of the Online Battles Upending Democracy in America

“Memes can convene armies and disarm enemies; they can also mobilize large groups of people when they are fed a steady stream of violence, aggression, and replacement anxiety.”
― Joan Donovan, Meme Wars: The Untold Story of the Online Battles Upending Democracy in America