It’s 2016. Justin Bieber is blasting, and you have just perfected your pout with the Snapchat Dog filter after watching Zoella’s latest makeup tutorial on YouTube. #LushLife.
For many of us, social media feeds over the last couple of weeks have been flooded with influencers (and just about everybody you know) time-travelling a decade into the past. I enjoy a nostalgic memory jog more than anyone, yet I cannot help but feel uncomfortable at the romanticisation of a year that shaped contemporary politics as we know it.
It’s 2016. The Brexit referendum is underway. The nation is divided, and misinformation is uncontrollable. Nationalism has well and truly been revived, and Nigel Farage is at the forefront, pushing dangerous narratives surrounding immigration. Across the pond, Americans are convinced that they are going to have their first female President, yet Trump ends up in the White House, mirroring an anti-immigrant rhetoric.
Sound familiar?
With nostalgia for ‘simpler times’ comes the danger of revisionist history – it is easy to forget these political contexts when King Kylie has resurfaced on Instagram and Karlie Kloss is pretending she does not know Taylor Swift (again).
There is no doubt that the technological developments of the last ten years, particularly the increased connectivity of social media and access to AI, have led to a yearning for a more peaceful time. You need look no further than the reactions to the 2016 trend itself to see that nothing can occur on the internet anymore without somebody having a raging opinion about it.
And yet, is this not infamously how the political sphere has always been? Perhaps 2016 internet culture was less politically charged, but should we really be chasing a blissfully ignorant society?
This escapism through the lens of the Rio de Janeiro Instagram filter proves possible only for a privileged audience. Whilst trends are working on a rapid cycle, and The Chainsmokers will soon be forgotten about once again, politics is not. The clear parallels between policy issues of 2016 and 2026, particularly surrounding the nostalgia politics of nationalism and anti-immigration, symbolise a lack of progression in the direction of policy attention.
As we reflect on a time where citizens were being told to Pokémon Go to the polls, one must consider whether the resurgence of the 2016 cultural aesthetic is simply an attempt to Mannequin Challenge our way out of the very similar political uncertainties of today?
Illustration by Kayleigh Yule for The Student.
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Looking Back at 2016 Through Rose-Tinted Glasses?
It’s 2016. Justin Bieber is blasting, and you have just perfected your pout with the Snapchat Dog filter after watching Zoella’s latest makeup tutorial on YouTube. #LushLife.
For many of us, social media feeds over the last couple of weeks have been flooded with influencers (and just about everybody you know) time-travelling a decade into the past. I enjoy a nostalgic memory jog more than anyone, yet I cannot help but feel uncomfortable at the romanticisation of a year that shaped contemporary politics as we know it.
It’s 2016. The Brexit referendum is underway. The nation is divided, and misinformation is uncontrollable. Nationalism has well and truly been revived, and Nigel Farage is at the forefront, pushing dangerous narratives surrounding immigration. Across the pond, Americans are convinced that they are going to have their first female President, yet Trump ends up in the White House, mirroring an anti-immigrant rhetoric.
Sound familiar?
With nostalgia for ‘simpler times’ comes the danger of revisionist history – it is easy to forget these political contexts when King Kylie has resurfaced on Instagram and Karlie Kloss is pretending she does not know Taylor Swift (again).
There is no doubt that the technological developments of the last ten years, particularly the increased connectivity of social media and access to AI, have led to a yearning for a more peaceful time. You need look no further than the reactions to the 2016 trend itself to see that nothing can occur on the internet anymore without somebody having a raging opinion about it.
And yet, is this not infamously how the political sphere has always been? Perhaps 2016 internet culture was less politically charged, but should we really be chasing a blissfully ignorant society?
This escapism through the lens of the Rio de Janeiro Instagram filter proves possible only for a privileged audience. Whilst trends are working on a rapid cycle, and The Chainsmokers will soon be forgotten about once again, politics is not. The clear parallels between policy issues of 2016 and 2026, particularly surrounding the nostalgia politics of nationalism and anti-immigration, symbolise a lack of progression in the direction of policy attention.
As we reflect on a time where citizens were being told to Pokémon Go to the polls, one must consider whether the resurgence of the 2016 cultural aesthetic is simply an attempt to Mannequin Challenge our way out of the very similar political uncertainties of today?
Illustration by Kayleigh Yule for The Student.
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