Marianne Williamson

About

Marianne Williamson is an American author, activist and spiritual guru best known for writing several self-help books that appeared on the New York Times "Advice, How To and Miscellaneous" bestseller list. In late June 2019, Williamson was the subject of various online discussions and internet memes following her appearance at a 2020 Democratic Party presidential debate in Miami, Florida.

History

In 1992, Williamson published the book A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of A Course in Miracles. That year, the book was promoted by Oprah Winfrey and was subsequently listed on the "Advice, How To and Miscellaneous" category of The New York Times bestseller list. In 1997, her book Healing the Soul of America was released.

2020 Presidential Campaign

On January 28th, 2019, Williamson officially announced she would be running for the Democratic nomination in the 2020 United States presidential election. The following day, a video of the announcement was uploaded to her official YouTube channel (shown below).

June 27th Democratic Debate

On June 27th, 2019, Williamson sparked many discussions on social media during her appearance at the 2020 Democratic Party presidential debate in Miami, Florida, where she criticized the American health care system (shown below, left) and claimed she would "harness love" to defeat Trump (shown below, right).

Additionally, Williamson stated that the first issue she would tackle as president is to contact the prime minister of New Zealand and say "the United States of America is going to be the best place in the world for a child to grow up" (shown below).

Meanwhile, screenshots of Williamson addressing the other candidates paired with humorous captions began circulating on Twitter (shown below).

Shortly after, many of Williamson's old tweets began circulating on Twitter, leading user @ellievhall^[7] to post a collection of the messages (shown below).

That same evening, Google Trends tweeted^[8] a graphic revealing that Williamson ended the night as the top searched Democratic candidate (shown below). The following day, NY Mag^[3] published an article featuring a quiz challenging readers to guess if quotes were from Williamson or the video game series Metal Gear Solid.

Neon Genesis Evangelion References

Several comments Williamson has made have been linked to the critically acclaimed anime Neon Genesis Evangelion. On December 10th, 2018, Williamson made a tweet (shown below, top) which drew responses linking it to Neon Genesis Evangelion's plot (shown below, bottom).^[4]

On June 29th, 2019, tumblr user turnipfritters posted a screenshot of the tweet with the caption "no other candidate is promising to start Third Impact," (shown below) gathering over over 12,000 notes.^[5]

On July 9th, 2019, Williamson posted a screenshot of Neon Genesis Evangelion character Asuka Langley Soryu overlaid with text of one of her earlier tweets (shown below). In her caption, she hinted at themes of Neon Genesis Evangelion, saying "There is literally nothing we could not achieve were we willing to join with each other at deeper levels… Humanity will literally not be able to survive itself, if we do not awaken to our oneness and come to the realization that in love and love alone are we at home."^[6]

On the same day, AV News published an article titled "Marianne Williamson's new campaign strategy: critical reads of Neon Genesis Evangelion."^[7] The article commented on how Williamson is echoing themes from Neon Genesis Evangelion, concluding "Williamson has obviously watched the series and seen in it not just an entertaining and provocative treatise on mental health, the difficulty of life in modern society, and the existential terror of the human condition, but a text worth publicly engaging with on the road to her destiny as the next President Of The United States Of America--or the next director of NERV."

July 30th Debate

Marianne Williamson's Flint, Michigan Comments

During the 2020 Democratic Debate in Detroit, moderators asked Williamson about the Flint Water Crisis, she responded:

Her comments found support and confusion among people on Twitter. In particular, people latched onto the phrase "dark psychic force of the collectivized hatred" (examples below).

Later in the night, when asked for a comment on her debate performance, Williamson responded, "I don't know yet. I mean, I'll tell you when, you know, later when I see the memes" (shown below).

Question: "Did this night go the way you hoped it would?"

Marianne Williamson: "I don't know yet. I mean, I'll tell you when, you know, later when I see the memes." pic.twitter.com/F4f5HunESD

— The Hill (@thehill) July 31, 2019

Cat Comments

On July 30th, journalist Philip Crowther tweeted a video of Williamson answering a young reporter's question about whether or not she has a pet. Williamson responded, "I had a cat and the cat died. The tweet received more than 1.3 million views, 19,000 likes and 3,400 retweets in 24 hours (shown below).

Young reporter to marwilliamson</a>: “Do you have a pet?”<a href="https://twitter.com/marwilliamson?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">marwilliamson to young reporter: “I had a cat and the cat died.” pic.twitter.com/jK8Miaf1TG

— Philip Crowther (@PhilipinDC) July 31, 2019

2024 Candidacy And TikTok Popularity

Marianne Williamson announced her 2024 presidential candidacy for the Democratic nomination for President on March 4th, 2023.^[14] Williamson was the first candidate to announce and challenge Joe Biden.

In the months after her announcement, Marianne Williamson "stan" accounts emerged on TikTok. Many prominent stan accounts featured videos of Williamson speaking during the 2020 televised debates or in press interviews. For example, a video (seen below, left) posted by @mariannewilliamson4prez received over 200,000 likes in the two weeks after it was posted on April 11th, 2023.^[16] Others were more absurdist and didn't feature the candidate speaking. For example, the TikTok (seen below, right) posted by @realdemocrat20 received over a quarter of a million likes over the course of April 2023.^[17]

On Williamson's official campaign account, she notably used TikTok-specific video production techniques. On the TikToks (examples seen below) posted by her official account, subtitles and instrumental soundtracks are often used, and the bottom half of the screen is sometimes taken up by a reaction GIF or some kind of filmed footage, like in overstimulation videos.

One TikTok posted on April 6th, 2023, received over 65,000 views (shown below, left).^[18] Another posted by Williamson on April 2nd, 2023, showed her thanking her fans on social media for a recent polling result, which showed her polling at 10 percent support among Democrats against Joe Biden's 73 percent support (shown below, right). This TikTok received almost 167,000 likes over the course of a month.^[19]

TikTok beef between Marianne Williamson stan accounts and users on the app supporting Biden escalated in late April 2023, when prominent stan account @mariannewilliamson4prez accused other users of mass-reporting their account to TikTok, which pulled it offline briefly on April 18th, 2023 (seen below). The account admins argue that her account was taken down because "they were scared of her" following a series of articles published in the press about Williamson's popularity on TikTok.^[20]

These articles included most prominently an April 14th Intercept article, which compared Marianne Williamson to Jordan Peterson because of her fusion of self-help language and a political message.^[15]

Criticism

Williamson has been considered something of an outlier in the field of Democrats vying for the presidential nomination. Many publications have criticized her past and present policy platforms, as well as her turns of phrase, as "outlandish" and "bonkers."^[10][11] In a viral game, New York^[3] magazine compared her words to that of the dialogue in the video game series Metal Gear.

In an op-ed for NBC, Noah Berlatsky wrote:

But this supposedly empowering rhetoric masks a mean-spirited individualism. Williamson, like conservative thinkers, often blames material problems on personal failures. Her ideology may sound airy and inoffensive, but it is ultimately one of neoliberal victim shaming. And it would lead to harmful policies if she were, by some miracle, to be elected to public office.

Allegations of Anti-Science Behavior

Anti-Vaccination Controversy

On June 19th, 2019, Twitter NBC reporter Julia Jester tweeted that Marianne Williamson "leans in to the vaccine skepticism" by comparing vaccination mandates to the abortion debate (shown below).

The following day, Williamson tweeted^[1] a statement that she understood "that many vaccines are important and save lives" (shown below).

On June 22nd, 2019, The Daily Beast published an article titled "Marianne Williamson, Longtime Wacko, Is Now a Dangerous Wacko," which accused Williamson of promoting anti-vaccination theories and general pseudoscience.

Criticism of Psychiatric Medicine

Williamson has also been publicly critical of psychiatric medicine. She told BuzzFeed^[11] in July 2019, "The twenties can be very hard. They’re not a mental illness. Divorce can be very difficult, losing a loved one, someone that you know died, someone left in a relationship and you’re heartbroken -- that’s very painful, but it’s not a mental illness."

On July 30th, 2019, Twitter user @brosandprose tweeted,^[11] "Marianne Williamson has implied that people who take antidepressants are weak, that you can cure cancer and HIV with love, and that fat people need to pray more. She’s a heinous wind chime of a human and I’m losing a lot of respect for people praising her right now. #DemDebate." The tweet received more than 54,000 likes and 12,000 retweets in 24 hours (shown below).

On July 31st, Twitter^[10] user @courtenlow tweeted, "These are some of the things Marianne Williamson has tweeted about mental health and antidepressants. She is hideously dangerous." The tweet received more than 400 likes and 220 retweets (shown below).

Her tweets show a distinct skepticism of the effectiveness of psychiatric drugs. For example, she refers to depression as a "spiritual disease" and calls the disorder "an arbitrary diagnosis."

Orbs

On April 29th, 2019, Chapo Trap House uploaded an episode titled "Marianne Mindset" which discussed Williamson's campaign.^[8] 9:07-9:21 is the earliest known usage of the association of Marianne Williamson with orbs (transcript below).

And, do you think FaZe Banks fully understands Williamson's spiritual science? No. Most people don't. Most people couldn't spend, you know, a fucking week in an advanced astrology program, they couldn't tell you what part of the orb is which…

On June 8th, 2019, Virgil Texas responded to a tweet about Williamson with "#OrbGang" (shown below, top).^[9]

On June 26th, 2019, Virgil Texas tweeted a link to an interview Chapo Trap House did with Williamson, using multiple orb emojis (shown below).^[10]

Search Interest

External References