UK’s Labour Is Winning the Meme War, but Young Voters Think It’s All Incredibly Embarrassing

Almost immediately after the UK general election was called on May 22, the meme war began. Social media campaigns from both the Labour and Conservative parties shared hundreds of memes, from Labour’s viral TikTok using English singer and TV presenter Cilla Black’s “Surprise! Surprise!” to mock the Conservative Party’s plans for mandatory national service at the age of 18, to the Tories’ TikTok video showing only blank slides titled “Here are all of Labour’s policies.” Reform UK, the Liberal Democrats, and the Green Party have contributed their own share of memes in the lead-up; meanwhile, the two leading parties in the polls have been engaged in a “trolling” back and forth on platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and X.

“The shitposters have gone mainstream,” says political strategist Jack Spriggs from Cavendish Consulting,…