Beautiful, my friend! 😍

We’ve poured much care into crafting this piece; please read and share! See full paper below 👇 Thank you, Julie Yujie Chen, @grohmannrafael.bsky.social, Andrea Pollio, @cheryllsoriano.bsky.social, and @nielsvdoorn.bsky.social for being such a home for us! journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

We argue war influencers matter because they (1) fill the void left by mainstream journalism, (2) democratize conflict communication, (3) build bottom-up epistemologies, (4) reshape how war is seen, felt, and known by young ppl & (5) blur witnessing with performance, raising urgent ethical stakes👇

🔎 Using ethnographic lens, we analyzed 97 TikTok videos from Ukrainian (🇺🇦) creators, identifying three styles of war communication: POV Storytelling - intimate war testimonies; Memetic Remixing - war + trending memes; Playful Politainment - using LIVE, humor, and performance to fundraise & mobilize👇

To make sense of war influencers, we draw from three key traditions: 📸 War Photography - the long legacy of visualizing suffering, ✊ Citizen Journalism - real-time, mobile, from-the-ground truth-telling, 🔉 Creator & Platform Studies - platform vernaculars, algorithmic fluency, and visibility labor👇

We dive into *user-war influencers* and read them as content creators embedded in conflict zones who document, narrate, and aestheticize their experiences through platform-native vernaculars. They don’t monetize for profit, but for their authoritative voice in shaping public discourse👇

We offer a typology with two kinds of war influencers: 🤳Celebrity-war influencers - existing stars who use their status to engage in wartime advocacy (like Gigi Hadid); 🤳User-war influencers - individuals who rise from anonymity into global fame, depending solely on algorithmic amplification👇

It’s so tiring to fight a majority that keeps driving us toward a reckless future. But we know there is still a path forward; one that begins with the basic recognition of existence for both Israelis & Palestinians. Hope is resistance @standing-together.bsky.social @alonlee.bsky.social 🟣 💜

That same Meir Kahane, symbol of violent, racist Jewish ultranationalism. "The singer, who also spent time in prison, explains why he believes both The Hague and Gaza should be flattened (...) claims that Netanyahu is the 'left of the right'"; This isn't a marginal voice. This is Israel.