Bullet Men
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About
Bullet Men refers to the statues of three silver, naked muscular men wearing phallic helmets installed outside the Olympic Media Center in Pyeongchang, South Korea. In early February, the photographs of the statues went viral under the Japanese hashtag #モルゲッソヨ, (pronounced "Morregessoyo"), which translates to "I have no idea" in Korean.
Origin
Located in front of the Alpensia Ski Jumping Center in Pyeongchang, South Korea, the "Bullet Men" were designed by Korean artist Kim Ji-hyun and installed in 2009.[1] The statues (shown below) symbolize "the human desire for a cool body, wealth, honor with a concrete image."
Spread
With the start of the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang on February 7th, people began noticing the statues. That day, Japanese Twitter users began using the hashtag "#モルゲッソヨ" (translation: "I have no idea") to discuss the statues.
That day, Twitter[2] user @p7dea46c tweeted to an article o worldfn.net[3] about the objects. This is the earliest known usage of the hashtag (shown below, left).
The following day, Twitter[4] user @wakuteka_the1st shared an article from Tokyo-Sports.co.jp[5] about the statues, using the hashtag. The tweet (shown below, center) received more than 800 retweets and 580 likes in five days.
That day, Twitter[6] user @KigaNatsuno tweeted an ASCII image of the statues, making it one of the earliest known uses of the statues as a meme. The tweet (shown below, right) received more than 380 retweets and 400 likes in five days.
The following day, Twitter[7] user @CPUX4 tweeted a video of the statues dancing. The video (shown below) received more than 35,000 retweets, 40,000 likes and 1.5 million views in four days.
Several media outlets covered the Bullet Men, calling attention to its popularity as a meme. These outlets include, BuzzFeed,[8] New York magazine,[9] The Daily Dot,[10] HuffPost,[11] Cosmopolitan[12] and more.
On February 12th, Twitter[13] published a Moments page calling the Bullet Men "Japan's favorite Olympic meme."
すぐに作れそうだったのでつい・・・。#モルゲッソヨ pic.twitter.com/vVOtGy1w05
— CPUX4 (@CPUX4) February 9, 2018
Various Examples
External References
[1] Yonhapnews – "Bullet Men" statues and human-faced bird, surprise stars of Olympics
[2] Twitter – @p7dea46c's Tweet
[3] WorldFn – ◆ Pyeongchang Olympics ◆ The topic "mysterious objects" in front of the main press center is laughing too hotly!
[4] Twitter – @wakuteka_the1st's Tweet
[5] Tokyo-Sports – 【Pyeongchang Olympics】 Before the main press center 'Mystery objects'
[6] Twitter – @KigaNatsuno's Tweet
[7] Twitter – @CPUX4's Tweet
[8] BuzzFeed – There Are Three Giant Penises In Front Of The Olympics Media Village And It's Become A Huge Meme
[9] New York Magazine – Phallic Statues Early Contenders for Best Meme of the Olympics
[10] The Daily Dot – Penis-man statues at the Olympics are a gold-medal meme
[11] HuffPost – It’s Really Hard Not To Notice All The Penises At The Olympic Ski Jump Center
[12] Cosmopolitan – So, Uh, There Are 3 Very Prominent Penises on Display in the Olympic Village
[13] Twitter – The penis-men statues in PyeongChang are Japan's favorite Olympic meme
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