The Brief: Post-Area 51 'raid,' memes are popping up on Reddit about a possible plan to 'raid' the Vatican Secret Archives.
DEEP DIVE
Now that the Area 51 “raid” is over, Redditors are looking for a new highly-secure landmark to make memes about. On Reddit, specifically r/dankmemes, there is much buzz around the concept of “raiding” the secret Vatican archives. These Vatican raid memes suggest that people get together, don crusade costumery, and make their way into the Vatican’s secret archive vaults.
The Vatican Secret Archives
Similar to Area 51, the Vatican Secret Archives (Archivum Secretum Apostolicum Vaticanum) are the subject of numerous urban myths about their mysterious contents. While parts of the Vatican are open to the public, the secret archives are only accessible by select church officials and scholars. These archives contain records of the Holy See: the pope’s jurisdiction within Vatican City.
In addition to containing classified information about the Catholic church and interesting historical documents, some conspiracy theorists speculate that these archives may also contain evidence of extraterrestrial life, demons, secret codes, and more.
Vatican Raid Memes
Whether Vatican raid memes will take off and continue the momentum of the Area 51 raid remains to be seen. At the time of writing, Vatican “raid” plans are much smaller than the 2+ million RSVP Area 51 raid. On the Dank Memes subreddit, memes about a raid are receiving tens of thousands of upvotes. There is a Facebook event titled “Let’s raid the vatican archives,” scheduled for May 1, 2o2o at 4:20 pm, with 27 RSVPs. The subreddit r/VaticanRaid, which was created after the Area 51 raid currently has 147 members.
The first known Vatican raid meme was posted on r/dankmemes on September 20th, the day of the Area 51 raid:
Vatican memes tend to have some overlap with crusades memes.
Smooth from VaticanRaid