Why Kamala Harris memes hit different

23 Jul Why Kamala Harris memes hit different

Context, as Kamala Harris might remind you, is key.

Consider the vice president’s May 2023 line about falling out of a coconut tree, part of a riff about historical context. Until recently, it had been a cringe joke haunting her online image. Within the context of her new switcheroo presidential candidacy, though, it quickly became something else. That line is now a digital call to arms across countless TikTok videos, and a visual signifier, with coconut tree emoji dotting social media handles everywhere. Whether this new wave of support exists within the context of irony or not is beside the point. Either way, the groundswell of unmistakable enthusiasm fueling it suggests a massive—and massively memeable—vibe shift has just upended this election.

Harris’s skyrocketing memeability may have put her in prime position for actually capturing Gen Z’s attention—and possibly even their votes.

When the coconut tree memes first came into prominence after Biden’s disastrous debate performance last month, they seemed to be an ironic mayday gesture—even Kamala would be better! A lot of casual observers who have only noticed them since Biden’s withdrawal from the race, however, may not realize that or care. All they will see is a widespread inoffensive meme about the new presidential contender; irony and sincerity melded together in wholesome hullabaloo, and difficult to tell apart. Even Harris’s situational resemblance to Julia Louis-Dreyfus on Veep, once wielded as a weapon against her, has now been repurposed and, as some say, “coconut-pilled.”

Vice President Harris’s fellow politicians have embraced the meme—tweeting out the emoji, or in the case of Hawaiian Senator Brian Schatz, an actual coconut tree, as a winking show of support.

While TikTokers have been posting “coconut tree remixes” of songs by Taylor Swift and Kim Petras, pop stars themselves have gotten in on the act too, with Kesha embracing a remix of one of her songs, and Charli XCX offering her version of a coronation. Harris’s campaign was even savvy enough to proudly tout Charli’s endorsement. Within hours, Team Harris had made the particular lime-green shade of Charli’s new album, one of this summer’s hottest hits, into the background header for the newly formed Kamala HQ account on X. (Bio line: Providing context.) 

People once scoffed at Hillary Clinton for chasing relevance on the campaign trail with her awkward “Pokemon Go to the polls” call to action. Now, relevance appears to be chasing Harris.

It’s quite an about-face from where matters stood just a month or two ago.

Before the infamous quote “You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?” emerged as her defining moment as vice president, Harris’s tenure was plagued by punchlines. She would say things like, “Space: It affects us all,” with a dreamy air of dorm-room epiphany, and those laugh lines tended to ring out much louder online than her powerful advocacy for reproductive rights. Despite her history as a former prosecutor and senator who made a splash with fiery rhetoric against Donald Trump, she was too often viewed as an ineffectual vice president, practically made of kooky gaffes. (You know, kind of like the two most recent commanders-in-chief?)

President Biden’s decision to withdraw from the race has not exactly erased that perception of Harris, but it has most certainly changed the context around it.

During the month since Biden’s catastrophic debate, voter confidence in the president cratered. According to recent polls, nearly two-thirds of Democrats were in favor of his dropping out of the race before he finally did so over the weekend. Given that Biden’s unpopularity was tied to his age, diminished capacity for public speaking, and seeming inability to make an effective case against his opponent, the idea of a two-decades-younger former prosecutor with a, uh, distinctive speaking style looked a whole lot different. As an appendage of Biden, those qualities were fodder for derisive memes. As an alternative to Biden—at his absolute weakest, no less—those qualities have become fodder for celebratory memes.

People are now posting coconut tree emoji as a way to embrace what they may have once found corny and bizarre. They’re no longer laughing at Harris, but with her—even if some of them are mostly just overjoyed to no longer be crying about Biden.

Will this laughter actually help Harris if she indeed becomes the nominee? Lest we forget, Biden himself long ago rode into America’s heart on a fleet of memes. Though it’s since been somewhat memory-holed by Biden’s feeble recent image, The Onion’s portrayal of him in the 2010s as a laid-back, Trans Am-washing granddad only created fondness and ironic celebration of his Scranton-Joe persona. That meme-made goodwill was already down to fumes by the time he last ran for president in 2020, though, and it never really replenished.  

There was one brief moment when a meme actually helped Biden during his presidency. A year after ”Let’s Go, Brandon” became a cheeky conservative anti-slogan, Biden’s team found a way to embrace it. On the day the president passed the Inflation Reduction Act, perhaps his signature initiative, his team started spreading the Dark Brandon meme—an image of Biden as laser-eyed avenging angel. Not only did that meme reclaim and completely defang “Let’s go, Brandon,” it also gave a much-needed aura of internet-savvy to the administration.

One of the main reasons Biden benefitted from appearing more plugged into online trends is because his opponent was one of the more memeable people who ever lived. A consummate showman, Trump came to the White House with a catchphrase and left with a signature dance move. Highly quotable gibberish spews from his mouth like draught beer, and fans seemingly can’t wait to emulate his trends at every turn. As president, Biden was lucky to get some Trumpian meme-heat with Dark Brandon. Ultimately, it may have hurt more than it helped. 

By the time Biden acted out the meme at the 2023 White House Correspondents Dinner, it had zero juice left and could only serve as an unflattering contrast with the man himself. And that was well before Biden’s debate performance put him beyond the aid of memes. From that point on, perhaps nothing could have made Biden or his team seem internet-savvy anymore. The president’s allies had previously announced a $25 million super PAC aimed at reaching Gen Z voters with videos created by professional comedy writers; after the debate, it was never mentioned again.

Judging from cacophony of coconut tree memes, though, Harris may not need quite as much help connecting with young voters as Biden did. Most promising for her prospects, though, may be the alternate current of memes built around Chappell Roan’s “Femininomenon” already emerging. (Buckle up for a flood of incoming Kamala-nomenon tweets.) 

We may all get sick of coconut tree memes any minute now, but this new development suggests that the excitement around Harris will stick around, regardless of the context that came before it.

Source: Fast Company