Why did the Internet love Cthulhu? Part 3
▍ Cthulhu for president!
In American politics, a joke about Cthulhu’s participation in the presidential election arose back in 1996 during the election race between Democrat Bill Clinton and Republican Bob Dole. The culprit of its occurrence was the same company Chaosium, which released the first desktop game about Cthulhu in 1981. Actually, the meme about “Cthulhu for President” arose from a completely official, but comic merch for the game “Call of Cthulhu”.
The product description read:
The year is 1996, and the horrors of the presidential campaign are again upon us. Now you can show your support to the only truly experienced candidate. The “Cthulhu for the President” set includes: red-white-blue campaign medal “Cthulhu in 96”; postcard with the image of Cthulhu in the White House; red-white-blue Cthulhu on the sign “96 yards”; 11″ x 17″ full color poster; red-white-blue window sign of the Ancient Party [отсылка к прозвищу республиканцев как GOP: «старая добрая партия»]; 8-page collection of speeches, posters and other memorabilia from 1996; red-white-blue “Cthulhu for President” bumper sticker; and a copy of the controversial “Contract for America” Cthulhu vision booklet.
The contents of the box quite accurately parodied typical American-style campaign merchandise.
In general, the joke was purely internal subcultural, designed for those very geeks who knew about Cthulhu and played board games, and also treated all and every election with a fair amount of skepticism and sarcasm. The slogan of the comic campaign played on the constant calls for the hesitant to “choose the lesser evil” from about equally dubious candidates from the establishment – and advised not to waste time on trifles, choosing the “greater evil” for once.
The most canonical version of the Cthulhu for President poster, presumably 2004
However, the topic has gone far not only to geeks – especially as the image of Cthulhu spread its tentacles into more and more popular culture, and the institution of the US presidency was severely tested. First, in 1998, interesting details of the communication between Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky in the Oval Office of the White House were revealed, and the president, without hesitation, publicly lied under oath. In 2000, George W. Bush was elected, and the fun turned downright grim with the roar of falling ammunition and the questionable content of “Bushism” – but his Democratic rival John Kerry is no less questionable for voters. Understanding the problematic nature of their candidates, political strategists spared no effort, hinting that their “boyfriend” may be so-so, but his opponent is just so-so.
It is no coincidence that just before the 2004 vote, one of the most memetic episodes of South Park was released: about the choice between a sandwich with excrement and a giant enema.
It is not surprising that dark jokes about “election of the lesser of evils” went well with American Internet audiences – and it was in 2004 that jokes about presidential candidate Cthulhu became truly viral. They embraced the American LiveJournal and infiltrated the Russian one, whose audience was then predominantly oppositional, and treated the 2004 Russian presidential elections with no less skepticism. However, they did not receive mass distribution, but our LiveJournal party began to understand more and more without explanation who Cthulhu is.
Well, the idea of Cthulhu for president, because “the best of the worst of evils,” has become a constant subject of jokes and memes in all American elections since the turn of the 2000s and 10s to this day. And not only in the American ones: it was used with might and main, say, in Poland in the 2010 elections.
On this we will break again – and in the next part we will discuss the image of Cthulhu at the peak of popularity, from 2006 to the present day. Fkhtagn!
