AFP, Posted on Saturday, July 08, 2023 at 9:52 pm.
Combining humor, mockery and seriousness, a group of Internet users who defend Ukraine on social networks and identify themselves as NAFO organized their own summit at a nightclub in Vilnius two days before the NATO leaders’ summit.
With tens of thousands of netizens donating to Ukraine, the North Atlantic Fella Organization — abbreviated as NAFO — has a knack for using memes against Russian propaganda.
NAFO’s founders use a popular Doge meme featuring a Shiba Inu dog to create personalized avatars for donors.
“We collected between 15 and 20 million dollars”, confirms Paul Peterson, one of NAFO’s founders and an American truck driver, without being able to say exactly how much.
On Twitter, NAFO’s account has more than 108,000 followers, and on other social media platforms, the community uses humor to counter the Russian narrative.
– ‘Humor and Weapons’ –
On Saturday, more than 100 people attended the NAFO summit at Disco.
Kirsty Harris, a 47-year-old British NHS health worker, got her Doge avatar in July.
He became very active on Twitter after Russia invaded Ukraine last year.
“I was banned (on Twitter, editor’s note) by the Russian embassy in London for calling them genocidal every day for about two months,” he told AFP.
Ms Harris then took a more humorous approach: ‘If you make them look stupid, it makes them back off a bit.’
British activist Mark Adam Harrold, who lives in Lithuania and organized the “summit”, believes that “humor and weapons” are the only way to confront Russia’s “absurdity”.
“The propaganda they spread is so fanatical that if you try to discuss it, there’s no way to stop it,” Mr Harold told AFP.
“If they’re spreading this ridiculous nonsense, the only way to respond is ridiculous,” he added, adding, “It’s not a joke.”
In a recent tweet, we see a photo of Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov with the imaginary line about cluster bombs that the US will deliver to Kiev: “But how dare Ukraine use the weapons we use against its own citizens against our soldiers?”.
The NAFO initiative has not gone unnoticed by the Ukrainian political class and NATO member states.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky presented NAFO with a special plaque in recognition of their efforts, and a tweet from Ukraine’s Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov supporting the community helped speed it up last year.
Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis himself attended the NAFO “summit” and addressed the participants.
“You’re funny, but you’re not a joke,” he told the audience. “Your community is an example of the creativity and ingenuity of people who are free to associate and express themselves in a democracy, and that is the strength of our organization,” he added.
Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, admired by the NAFO community, said countering Russian disinformation “requires a good sense of humor, intelligence and enthusiasm.”
“Behind every guy is a real person, volunteering your time and energy because you believe Ukraine will win,” he told attendees in a pre-recorded message.
“Keep fighting the good fight because the expansion of NAFO is non-negotiable,” he encouraged.
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