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I’m not you, babe When Thatcher passed away, some tweeters who opposed her politics celebrated using the hashtag #nowthatchersdead. However, the unfortunate lack of capitalization led many to mistakenly think that pop star Cher had died–they read the hashtag as “Now that Cher’s dead.” The campaign originated at the site IsThatcherDeadYet, whose final answer, YES, is approaching a quarter-million likes on Facebook. (Martin Belam)
In December, as an impromptu inside joke, British designer and journalist Martin Belam took 10 minutes to craft a pie chart entitled “What Twitter will look like on the day that Thatcher dies.” The former prime minister was reportedly ill at the time, and Belam and some journalist friends were discussing whether it was appropriate to satirize her. “She hadn’t even died,” Belam said, “and there was already a debate about how respectful you needed to be.” The pie included slices like “Journalists looking on Twitter for people who are gloating in order to write articles about the outrage.” It was retweeted about 200 times, and then shares dwindled to a handful per week.
Four months later, on April 8, Margaret Thatcher did die. The tweet has since been shared more than 3,100 times. Belam has gotten a range of reactions, from Thatcher loyalists opposed to joking about her death to folks who found it hilarious. “All the range of human emotions have been directed at me through the medium of this pie chart,” he said.
The Editors are the staffers of the Columbia Journalism Review.