Welcome to the age of Slopaganda: Iran takes on Trump at his own game
The terminally online among us will be familiar with President Donald Trump’s obsession with AI slop.
As is the wont of many social media-addled baby boomer retirees, Trump seems easily impressed by the low-quality CGI that oozes out of various text-to-video and music-synthesising generative engines – so much so that he feels the need to share it on his social media channels.
Although seen as a new vessel for blunt messaging that supports his own ends and slights his enemies, there is a minority view that Trump generally shares these videos for no more sophisticated reason than because he finds them amusing. But this pastime now risks becoming an Achilles heel in the propaganda battle currently raging around his latest military incursion.
A number of accounts linked to, or at least supportive of the Iranian regime have started posting AI-generated videos that are a clear pastiche of the exact variety of slop Trump loves to share.
These ‘Slopaganda’ videos, AKA ‘Meme Warfare’ are often animated and-or musical and marked by cartoonish and crude humour, Trump (often accompanied by Benjamin Netanyahu) is roundly ridiculed for US planes being shot down, called out for alleged civilian casualties, mocked for the exorbitant cost of the war, or just personally ridiculed.
It might seem like juvenile schoolyard tit-for-tat but there’s something shrewder underpinning this tactic. By tapping into the online attention economy with Trump-style AI slop, Iran is meeting Trump on his own terrain and turning his own weapons against him.
The messaging in the videos could just about classify as a destabilisation tactic; it’s close enough to the talking points that have shaken the Trump base’s support for the Iran war - but clearly there’s no expectation that these dumb videos are going to sway the UN or any other diplomatic power brokers to act against the USA. They are targeting Trump and in inner circle on a personal level.
By eating into Trump’s share of voice in the and insulting him personally Iran is aiming both to enrage the president into a like-for-like response and, in doing so, to command a share of his attention that might otherwise be apportioned to bombings and troop deployment.
And it’s working. A clearly rattled Trump has taken time to respond to the campaign on his media rounds as well as upping his own AI slop output in what some interpret as direct retaliation. The age of Slopaganda – of Meme Warfare- is upon us, and Iran’s asymmetrical tactics are proving effective.
Pink Pony Pitchforks
There are those that would have you believe a woman at the height of her career is on borrowed time in the limelight. The recent furore surrounding Chappell Roan’s alleged treatment of a child that had the misfortune of merely being in her vicinity has caused quite the media storm this week, with such unimpeachable voices as Jameela Jamil making the point that any successful woman is ‘only allowed two years at the top before she’s dragged into hell and submission.’
A melodramatic albeit accurate way to describe the toxicity in today’s pop culture that sees pitchforks lying in wait to catch the scent of any wrongdoing by a young star enjoying such successes as Chappell Roan has in recent years.
The incident occurred at a hotel in Brazil where Chappell was to perform at a festival the following the day, and after being spotted at breakfast by 11-year-old Ada Law (Jude Law’s daughter, as if this could get any worse), she walked past Chappell’s table to catch a glimpse. The result was security guard Pascal Duvier issuing some stern words to the girl and her mother.
The fallout of this has been nothing short of a character assassination of Chappell Roan, your favourite artist’s favourite artist now being painted as the wicked witch of the breakfast buffet. One can’t help but think Jameela might have a point here, that the timing of this ‘smear campaign’ is mighty convenient since Chappell recently announced she’d parted ways with her talent agency led by Casey Wasserman after his name was revealed in the Epstein Files.
Chappell Roan Leaves Agency After Epstein Revelations: What To Know
Now that the gossip media mob has sank its teeth into its latest victim, this is more likely symptomatic of how today’s ‘fanbases’ can’t help themselves but rip apart anyone who is at their peak when given the slightest signal it’s ok to do so. Chappell Roan is the latest in a long line of beloved celebs to bear the cross of being this week’s problematic queen, and sadly, she’ll certainly not be the last.
Sora subject for OpenAI
OpenAI’s decision to shut down Sora - its hyper‑realistic AI video generator - lands as a surprise. In terms of cultural footprint, Sora had climbed into the same tier as DALL·E as the leading gen-AI media brands. The pace at which these AI behemoths have developed their tech is staggering when looking back to the early 2020s, where a janky Will Smith shovelled spaghetti into a melting face.
And given that Disney had pledged a ten-figure licensing deal, opening the door for users to experiment with their IP, Sora was posing some difficult questions for Hollywood. While many creatives are reasonably concerned by AI’s rapid progress, this setback shows it isn’t so straightforward, and how easy it can be to get lost in the hype. When you consider how costly these platforms are to run, and users using these tools to create deepfakes and unsolicited pornography, the rollout of this technology requires a lot more thought than what is currently being displayed by Silicon Valley.
With OpenAI under intense pressure to cut costs ahead of a possible IPO, Sora had become a problem. While its shutdown isn’t the end of OpenAI’s ambitions in AI‑generated video, it does underline something deeper. The old “move fast and break things” ethos is starting to collide with the scale and consequences of modern AI. The industry is still wrestling with what it’s willing to sacrifice in the race to build the most powerful systems imaginable, and whether the trade‑offs that have already arrived are worth it.
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