U.K. politics can be confusing but can also sometimes function like a video game. After all, where else can you stop an entire law-making session in its tracks and simultaneously cause a small uproar by grabbing an ornamental stick in the middle of a contentious work meeting? The government comes with a pause button.
As is the case in most political arenas, small gestures can very easily turn into public-facing outcries. That is why we now need to talk about Jeremy Corbyn and the DOOM mod that lets you fight and kill a mecha-devil version of former U.K. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.
The mod, called THATCHER’S TECHBASE, makes an extra-demonic version of the titular Thatcher who is trying to make the U.K. into the 10th circle of hell. And an arcade version of that modded game popped up at The World Transformed, a left-wing festival currently taking place in Liverpool featuring “radical politics, art, and music.”
If you’re an American reader wondering who all of these people are, here’s a brief explanation for you. Thatcher was the U.K.’s first female Prime Minister, serving in the role from 1979 to 1990, before eventually retiring from politics and dying in 2013 at the age of 87. She is revered in many conservative and right-wing political circles for her strong leadership, while being maligned by the more liberal-leaning for her economic policies and views on minorities in England, amongst other things. As far as politicians go, she’s like the Sonic series of the U.K.: everyone has a very strong opinion on her. Meanwhile, Corbyn is a current politician in the U.K. and former leader of the country’s Labour party, the biggest left-leaning political party in the U.K.
You can see where this is going. A left-wing politician plays a video game where the main objective is fighting and killing a satanic robot version of a famous right-wing politician and her demon minions. That’s probably not going to go over well with a bunch of people.
Alternatively, it’s gone over smashingly with many others more attuned to Corbyn’s politics, which means it’s an absolute headline fiesta for various U.K. outlets that are trying to turn Corbyn playing an arcade game into a news story.
In addition to, you know, turning Thatcher into a cyborg demon, the mod and its creators aren’t very shy about their politics. The beginning of the game comes with a dedication to “everyone that Thatcher hated and everyone who hated Thatcher,” and the arcade version of the game that popped up at The World Transformed was created to support Living Rent, an organization that advocates for housing rights and affordable housing in Scotland.
So, if you’re wondering why you’re suddenly seeing DOOM, Margaret Thatcher, and someone named Jeremy Corbyn all thrown together on your timeline today, that’s why.
