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| Power of Pooh: can the bear meme help Britain through a referendum bust-up? | |
| (35 minutes later) | |
| For a bear famously of very little brain, Winnie the Pooh has had a few things to say on the Brexit debate. A meme surfaced on social media feeds in which Pooh and his friend Piglet are seen walking through the woods – or a desolate post-EU wasteland, depending on how you look at it. “Are we still friends?” asks the Leave-voting Piglet, warily. “Yes,” Pooh – a Canadian immigrant, let’s not forget – replies. So that’s all right then. | For a bear famously of very little brain, Winnie the Pooh has had a few things to say on the Brexit debate. A meme surfaced on social media feeds in which Pooh and his friend Piglet are seen walking through the woods – or a desolate post-EU wasteland, depending on how you look at it. “Are we still friends?” asks the Leave-voting Piglet, warily. “Yes,” Pooh – a Canadian immigrant, let’s not forget – replies. So that’s all right then. |
| People shared this on social media, in the hope that the rapprochement between AA Milne’s characters could remind us all to move forward together. Except not everyone felt as forgiving. “Shove your ‘Winnie the Pooh’ meme up your arse!” writes one person on Facebook. Over on Twitter, someone writes: “That Winnie the Pooh ‘are we still friends’ meme can fuck off. This wasn’t a vote on the X-Factor final.” | People shared this on social media, in the hope that the rapprochement between AA Milne’s characters could remind us all to move forward together. Except not everyone felt as forgiving. “Shove your ‘Winnie the Pooh’ meme up your arse!” writes one person on Facebook. Over on Twitter, someone writes: “That Winnie the Pooh ‘are we still friends’ meme can fuck off. This wasn’t a vote on the X-Factor final.” |
| Jennie Stevenson, an editor for a parents’ website in Chester, decided to rewrite it. Stevenson’s bear spells out the consequences of the vote to him and his children (Pooh has cubs?), including economic disaster, destabilisation and a surge in racism. “While you might not have wanted that, you legitimised it, and decided that other animals’ lives and security were collateral damage,” he says. It has been shared tens of thousands of times. | Jennie Stevenson, an editor for a parents’ website in Chester, decided to rewrite it. Stevenson’s bear spells out the consequences of the vote to him and his children (Pooh has cubs?), including economic disaster, destabilisation and a surge in racism. “While you might not have wanted that, you legitimised it, and decided that other animals’ lives and security were collateral damage,” he says. It has been shared tens of thousands of times. |
| Related: Memes to cheer you up if you voted remain | Related: Memes to cheer you up if you voted remain |
| “Although I appreciate the gesture [of the original], it made me really angry because this wasn’t a football result or something that you could just get over,” she says. “It is not something that has stopped happening. I just thought I wanted to write something that was maybe a little more nuanced about how I was feeling.” People’s politics aren’t separate from who they are, she says. Pooh can barely contain his contempt: “I’ve seen another side of you that I hadn’t before and it’s going to take me some time to process that.” | “Although I appreciate the gesture [of the original], it made me really angry because this wasn’t a football result or something that you could just get over,” she says. “It is not something that has stopped happening. I just thought I wanted to write something that was maybe a little more nuanced about how I was feeling.” People’s politics aren’t separate from who they are, she says. Pooh can barely contain his contempt: “I’ve seen another side of you that I hadn’t before and it’s going to take me some time to process that.” |
| Milne’s stories have long been ripe for parodies and appropriations. The Tao of Pooh used the characters to illustrate the Chinese philosophy of Taoism, and you can’t open Instagram or Pinterest without coming across some nugget of profundity from the pages of Pooh. The Pooh Perplex and the follow-up Postmodern Pooh, by English professor Frederick Crews, are a spoof collection of essays sending up pretentious literary criticism. | Milne’s stories have long been ripe for parodies and appropriations. The Tao of Pooh used the characters to illustrate the Chinese philosophy of Taoism, and you can’t open Instagram or Pinterest without coming across some nugget of profundity from the pages of Pooh. The Pooh Perplex and the follow-up Postmodern Pooh, by English professor Frederick Crews, are a spoof collection of essays sending up pretentious literary criticism. |
| Stevenson typed it out quickly, put it on Facebook and friends started sharing it (someone else put her text on the original image). “Knowing so many people feel the same way as I do has been really helpful. I know a lot of people have fallen out with their parents, who have opposing views, and I think it has helped for them to express how they’re feeling. I guess because British people aren’t good at talking about feelings, you can just put it in a meme. And put a knob gag in as well – that helps.” | Stevenson typed it out quickly, put it on Facebook and friends started sharing it (someone else put her text on the original image). “Knowing so many people feel the same way as I do has been really helpful. I know a lot of people have fallen out with their parents, who have opposing views, and I think it has helped for them to express how they’re feeling. I guess because British people aren’t good at talking about feelings, you can just put it in a meme. And put a knob gag in as well – that helps.” |