XVII Congress of the Brazilian Studies Association

The Extraordinary (and Extremely Short) Story of How Bolsonaro Prevent the Third World War

• In Event: Re-assembling the Socio-Political Imaginary in Brazilian Contemporary Brazilian Mediaspace

Abstract

On February 14, 2022, former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro traveled to Russia to hold official meetings with Vladmir Putin. The motivation for the trip was classified “on the grounds of national security” (a practice that was fairly common during Bolsonaro’s term), although it was likely a simple mission to discuss commercial agreements. However, Bolsonaro’s supporters immediately started to speculate a more noble and secret reason for the trip: to avoid the imminent conflict between Russia and Ukraine. It was a convenient coincidence that, precisely on the same day of Bolsonaro’s arrival, Putin announced a partial retreat of his troops from the border between the countries. The then Brazilian minister of the environment, Ricardo Salles, tweeted that “Putin signaled a retreat in Ukraine; president Bolsonaro prevents the 3 World War”. A few hours later, Salles also posted an evidently fake cover of Time magazine with a picture of Bolsonaro characterized as “person of the year.” The following days saw a flood of memes in different platforms and social media depicting Bolsonaro as a holy messiah capable of brokering global peace. This memetic propaganda was, however, rapidly countered by several ironical memes that poked fun at such absurd and disproportionate allegations. The goal of this presentation is to analyze this short-lived “memetic war” as representative of the power memes have been exerting in the Brazilian political scenario. More than just the repeated use of memes to express political affects and emotions, I suggest that public discourse has been heavily conditioned by a “memetic logic” that spreads virally throughout the social fabric in the conditions of current digital culture.

Author

• Erick Felinto, Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro