On Thursday morning in Europe, the top news notification related to Mark Rutte, former Dutch prime minister and current secretary-general of NATO. Rutte was being repeatedly asked by media about supposedly calling Donald Trump “daddy”.
The 2025 NATO summit in The Hague followed bunker buster bombs having just been dropped on Iran, along with who knows how many Israeli missiles. A peace-deal in the bloodthirsty Ukraine war, meanwhile, remains elusive. News headlines, however, were dominated by talk of Rutte and Trump’s “bromance”.
Rutte was forced to clarify: “In Europe, I hear sometimes countries saying, ‘Hey, Mark, will the U.S. stay with us?’”, said Rutte. “And I said that sounds a little bit like a small child asking his daddy, ‘Hey, are you still staying with the family?’” The Streisand effect went into action, and Rutte’s clarification only added to the ruckus.
Trump later responded to press questions: “No, he likes me. I think he likes me. If he doesn’t I’ll let you know,” said Trump. “I’ll come back and I’ll hit him hard.” This followed Trump earlier saying Israel and Iran “don’t know what the fuck they’re doing.”
With video feeds mostly driven by an after-hours, smartphone-based desire for comedy and entertainment, the news cycle has become deeply unserious. Trump’s post-2024 return to the White House is just a symptom.
Last month, the ALP’s social media accounts received literally millions of views for their 2-bit ridicule of the Liberal-National Coalition. Almost all the content was memes featuring Medicare cards and tongue-in-cheek representations of Albanese as a teenage heart-throb.
After the “daddy” circus, the literal White House posted a reel captioned “Daddy’s home.” It featured slow motion edits of Trump walking off Air Force One back onto American soil, all to a soundtrack of Usher’s R&B hit, “Hey Daddy”.
The devolution of politics to TikToks/Instagram reels is the natural outcome of the major parties contracting out their public presence to marketing and PR firms: attention over content, medium over message. Perhaps this is why the Independent candidates – with the earnestness of their positions, the sincerity of their statements, and the downright boringness of their personal presentations – are somehow so refreshing in 2025.
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