Russians have been controlling Western political rhetoric for quite some time. They look for fringe conspiracy theories and promote them in an attempt to gradually degrade the institutions they target. This is confirmed KGB strategy (watch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3qkf3bajd4). [Embed] Think about it:
- flat earth, moon landing conspiracies: degrade public faith in NASA, degrade the space program and technological innovation.
- climate change denialism: degrade public faith in environmental protections, degrade public health and natural resources.
- pizzagate: degrade public faith in culture and entertainment while fomenting skepticism of political institutions, degrade the economy and faith in political systems.
- Seth Rich, Sandy Hook, etc. - cause political chaos, degrade morale
- transgender bathroom controversy - distract from real political issues
... (the list goes on)
They mainly use 4chan, Facebook and fake news to accomplish this, sewing seeds of fear and anxiety over political wedge issues in the general public. Inevitably, people in the U.S. and other Western countries pick up on this and become obsessed with these controversial issues. They look for YouTube videos and blog posts and articles that help feed into this confirmation bias. Over time, the public is demoralized and nothing gets done. Very smart tactic.
Honestly, Russians are smart as all hell. As an American I admire them and their culture. Beautiful architecture, art, music, etc. But most of all, the ingenuity. Study your history. Russians were doctoring political opponents out of photographs a half a century before Photoshop was initially released. Follow the money. The neocons you see in the U.S. government have financial ties to Russia. They want to start an artificial cold war to make more money. Russia puts on the front of being this weak, oil-dependent state. Really, they're responsible for NK and China.
It's not memetics. It's propaganda.