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Twitter and the glory of “Marine Todd”

by on March 29, 2014 at 11:28 pm

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A "Marine Todd" collage

A “Marine Todd” collage

The same weekend we had quite possibly the worst meme in the history of Twitter- “#CancelColbert“- also gave rise to one of the best, “Marine Todd.” I guess Twitter, like Leonard Cohen once said about America, is “the cradle of the best and the worst.”

Some explanation: If you have a friend or relative who’s part of the right-wing email circuit, chances are you’ve probably seen a particular email forward. It differs in particular details, but the general gist is that a professor is teaching a college class, tells his students that God doesn’t exist, and that if he did, God would knock the professor off the podium. Then a student in the class- a Marine and war veteran- knocks the professor out cold, and states “God was busy. He sent the Marines.”

Here’s another, more recent version. 

The story is silly for a few reasons: It’s certainly apocryphal- email versions go back to at least 2004– and it’s so obviously flattering to conservative political  prejudices. It’s also insulting to Marines, in implying that they make a habit of physically assaulting college professors. The icky implication is that the purpose of the heroes who have been to war, now that they’re home, is to beat up liberal civilians, for the pleasure of conservative civilians.

The meme also bears more than a passing resemblance (minus the violence, of course) to the plot of “God’s Not Dead,” the recently released Christian movie, which may explain why it’s resurfaced lately.

But then Twitter got ahold of this- I believe the mentions on this tweet, from March 22, is where it originated– and it was glorious:   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The only question is, who will be the conservative answer to Suey Park, who sees this meme and concludes that these people hate America and the troops? They don’t, of course; it’s a parody of the cartoonish way the right wing views the military, as well as the established phenomenon of brain-dead email forwards from your Republican uncle.

(Note: Nicole Mullen of Thought Catalog wrote about this earlier in the week, although I was not aware of her post until I was done with this one.)
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TAGS: #cancelColbert, email forwards, Internet, Marine Todd, Suey Park

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  • disqus_ldTeP6rX6V

    Marine Todd just came back from Uzbeki-Stan-Stan where he did fifty tours of duty defending America. Marine Todd was like totally tired dude because he had major jet lag and was like sixty-eight years old but he still looked young and fit like famous football player which he was also before going to Uzbeki-Stan-Stan. He was majorly smart too which is why he elected to go to Harvard on the GI Bill which was totes not a government program like welfare and such. He wanted to major in engineering but Barack Hooseing NoBUMMER imposed Sharia law, how I do not know, and made Todd major in Muslim Atheist Feminism. Marine Todd’s professor was like short and kinda lumpy and he looked like a lib because libs look short and kinda lumpy.

  • disqus_ldTeP6rX6V

    Barack Hussein noBUMMER who made me have to post two posts also too, was grinning from behind his veil as Marine Todd’s short lumpy professor made the class read Mao’s little red book which is what Muslim is based on. The professor read “I hate America and love Muslim and will have chicken named after me.” “Take that back” said marine Todd. The class looked on scared like because obamacare made them all get brain chip implants to be compliant. “No,” grinned the rich adjunct professor who was very powerful because America spends trillions on universities and nothing on its noble military. Marine Todd got up and approach the short liberal professor and punched him in the face like marines do and also nypd too. The professor was out cold and the girls, who were blonde and wholesome all suddenly understood that marine Todd was smarter and better than anyone at Harvard and sexier also too.