# Erdogan Erdogan refers to an image macro pairing Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan with Gollum from Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings films. The comparison gained international attention in late 2015 after a Turkish doctor was prosecuted for sharing it on Facebook, forcing a court to formally evaluate whether Gollum was a hero or villain. ## Overview Erdogan is a side-by-side image macro that pairs photos of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan with stills of Gollum from Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings films[2]. The joke works on matching expressions, open mouths, wide eyes, similar hand gestures, letting the visual do the punchline without needing a caption. The format is best known internationally because of a 2015 Turkish criminal case built around it. Turkish doctor Bilgin Çiftçi was prosecuted after sharing the comparison on Facebook, and the court ended up commissioning an expert panel to determine whether Gollum was a hero or a villain before it could rule on the insult charge[4]. English-language readers picked up on the case as a textbook Streisand Effect situation[3]. ## How It Spread On December 2nd, 2015, Redditor Karrakan posted an article about the court case to r/worldnews[3]. Within 12 hours the thread had more than 6,600 upvotes and roughly 1,300 comments, with 97% of votes positive[3]. The same day, Redditor SmokeyBare posted the actual side-by-side image to r/pics, where it hit the front page with over 8,900 upvotes and 2,400 comments in the first six hours[3]. Commenters immediately framed the situation as a Streisand Effect case study, arguing the prosecution was pushing the image in front of a far larger audience than it would ever have reached otherwise[3]. Coverage jumped from Reddit into mainstream English-language outlets, with the absurd detail of a court literally judging Gollum driving most of the reporting[4]. The meme stayed a reference point for political censorship stories about Turkey through the 2016 coup attempt and the mass arrests that followed, which detained more than 50,000 people[2]. Erdoğan's own political career kept refreshing interest in the format. His 52.5% victory in the June 2018 presidential election, run under expanded executive powers granted by a 2017 referendum, brought another wave of critical image macros from opposition-aligned accounts online[1]. ## How to Use The template typically pairs a Gollum still with an Erdoğan photo showing a matching facial expression, no caption needed. Common convention leaves both images unlabeled and lets the visual similarity carry the joke. Variations sometimes swap in other Middle-earth characters or pair the Gollum still with different world leaders. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What is Erdogan? As a meme, Erdogan refers to the image macro comparing Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to Gollum from The Lord of the Rings[3]. ### Where did Erdogan come from? The comparison went international in late 2015 after Turkish doctor Bilgin Çiftçi was prosecuted for sharing it on Facebook, prompting a court to convene an expert panel to judge Gollum's character[4]. ### What does Erdogan mean? Online, the Erdogan meme names the specific Gollum comparison rather than the politician alone, and it is often cited as a Streisand Effect example[3]. ### How do you use Erdogan? People typically post the Gollum still next to a matched Erdoğan photo with a similar expression and let the visual similarity carry the joke[3]. ### Is Erdogan still popular? The Gollum image is best known for the 2015 court case, and Erdoğan-focused political image macros kept circulating through his 2018 re-election with 52.5% of the vote[1]. ## References 1. [https://edition.cnn.com/2018/06/24/europe/turkish-election-results-intl/index.html]() 2. [https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/people/recep-tayyip-erdogan]() 3. [https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/]() 4. [https://www.dha.com.tr/]() 5. [https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Erdogan]() --- Source: https://meme.com/memes/erdogan Published by meme.com — The Internet Meme Library