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What happened to the country in 2019 leaves few indifferent. Internet users did not pass by, who in their own way reflected about protests, modernity and our lives at the end of the “tenths”. Generation 20+ knows little about jokes. At our request, Doxa compiled a list of the main memes of the outgoing year.

2009–2019

All year on the Internet, they reflected on the changes that have occurred with our life and us over the past decade. #10YEARSCHALLENGE appeared as harmless fun with a comparison of its photos from 2009 and 2019, respectively, but soon grew into the production of memes, including political ones.

In modern Russian realities, the reflection on what has changed over the past decade, records a turning point between two Putin decades - carefree zero and crisis tenth. For modern 20-year-olds-the same generation, "grown up at Putin," to which so much attention has recently been focused-the meme about the decade has become existential.

Rosgvardeans - the most fragile material on Earth

Employees of the Rosguard created several years ago became one of the main anti -heroes of the outgoing 2019. In July and August, the Moscow Center turned into a regime object and visually resembled an illustration of Orwell’s novel. For several summer weeks, Muscovites watched the security forces engaged in mass beatings of peaceful protesters. As a result, young people who tried to stop beating were accused of "applying violence to representatives of the authorities."

The most memorable case was Sergei Abanichev, who threw an empty paper cup towards the Rosgvardein. This gave rise to the meme about the incredible fragility of the Russian Guards and their panic fear of paper cups.

I/we are the whole country

I/we are a lexical invention of a public campaign in defense of journalist Ivan Golunov, whom they tried to blame for drugs. In a few days, the phrase has become a universal way to express support and solidarity for any reason. This memorial slogan expresses the spirit of the time when public campaigns of a very different scale and orientation are constantly launched throughout the country, and platforms like Change.org in the conditions of dysfunctional communication of society with the state become key social institutions.

At the same time, the meme emphasizes the problem associated with the restriction of the economy of attention, when one or more very specific victims always become the object of support.

In any incomprehensible situation - Greta Tunberg

In September 2019, a sixteen -year -old eco -activist from Sweden spoke at the UN summit with an emotional speech, in which she denounced the older generation in indifference to the climatic crisis. The performance of Greta Tunberg caused a polar reaction and divided both Russian and foreign commentators into two camps - strictly “for” and “against” Greta.

Meanwhile, the expressive behavior of the activist with Asperger's syndrome dumped into memes for any occasion. So Greta became not only the “man of the year” (according to Time), but also literally the face of the generation.

What did political memes give us in 2019?

Most of the memes that we remembered in this article are not specifically Russian, but are of particular importance in relation to Russian reality. #10YEARSCHALLENGE-a distorted mirror in which you can compare the second Putin decade with the first, Greta Tunberg becomes a man-meme simultaneously with the heyday of the new generation of young activists in Russia, “Oke, Boomer” allows you to emphasize the difference between Soviet and post-Soviet generations, and “I/we”-the creative translation of Metoo and Jesuis into Russian- Shows how the whole Russian public life is limited to a gesture of solidarity with the victim. So we have entered a new decade-with an aggravated conflict of generations, Rosgvardids-players from Star Wars and young emotional activism. Those who say that the 20th begins in 2021, and not from 2020, in the end, you can answer “O'Kay, Boomer”.

Prepared jointly with Lyudmila Pashkovskaya,
DOXA for "New"