The first AI-era war is a "slopaganda" battle to control memes
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A LEGO man rapping about President Trump's TACO trades and an image of the commander-in-chief as a Jesus-like figure healing the sick are both symptoms of an AI-fueled propaganda boom driven by the Iran war.
Why it matters: AI "slopaganda," as such content is called, is the new reality moving forward when it comes to warfare, propaganda and information warfare experts tell Axios.
- "Slopaganda" is typically defined as viral, low-cost AI content that is easy to share, and some of it has convinced influencers to believe in conspiracy theories.
Catch up quick: Propaganda has long been a tool used by governments to influence and steer public opinion, but AI tools have made it faster and cheaper to generate, and nearly impossible to avoid on social media.
- "The AI LEGO videos are no different than the posters of 'Fight for Liberty' from the 1940s," Information Warfare Analyst Tal Hagin tells Axios.
- "It's the same thing. It's simplified, aesthetically pleasing propaganda pieces with a very clear message that anybody can understand."
How it works: Content like Iran's LEGO videos and AI images of Trump — as the pope, or a beefed-up Jedi — is meant to "grab eyeballs," Emerson Brooking, with the Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab, tells Axios.
- "The most important, valuable currency is attention," he added, saying that it was "inevitable" that AI tools would be used to spread propaganda.
- Novelty is a powerful way to "seize and sustain" attention, Brooking says, adding that immediately recognizable imagery, whether AI or not, can reach politically uninvested people who otherwise wouldn't have engaged with war-related content.
- "So that's why you see the White House putting out these super cuts of air strikes interspersed with Call of Duty and video game memes and why some Iranian proxies have settled on LEGOS to illustrate their stories."
- It's worth noting that the Trump administration's video game supercuts appeared to be made without AI enhancements.
Zoom in: Iran leaning on U.S. pop culture for its content isn't an accident.
- Brookings says Iran has been a "pioneer" in distributing propaganda since the country's 1979 revolution, and knows what to publish to resonate with a certain audience.
- "LEGO was an easy way to get their point across, and then they decided to make it their consistent aesthetic," he says.
Threat level: So much stylized AI content also comes with risks, Brookings says. Namely, that it can reduce viewer apathy and trivialize a conflict that has killed thousands.
- Even determining what content is AI has become more difficult, with convincing deepfakes and photos mixed among posts that are clearly fake or satirical.
The bottom line: AI-generated imagery is becoming a core tool in modern information warfare, and little is known about its long-term impact.
- Hagin was blunt about how prepared social media users are for it: "We're cooked," he says.
Go deeper: Trump's AI memes testing limits between satire and misinformation
