honestly i think this meme is a cope. The US won the propaganda campaign. Not even Russia gives a shit about the USSR's achievements in space anymore. Besides, people are just more impressed by the "personal scale." The USSR or even China could be the first one to make contact with aliens 50 light years away using signals and satellites. All of that becomes irrelevant in culture if some American shakes the hand of an alien and it's broadcasted live on TV. Chalk it up to western individualism, but the truth is that no one gives a shit about some machines, and they're definitely not going to give a shit someone being the first of anything if you can't sell it.
It's why Apple is so successful despite being years, even a decade, behind and failing to implement shit that Android and iOS jailbreak devs have released long ago. Those devs don't get the credit, and Apple reaps the benefits of other people's work thanks to their marketing team. Really, it reminds me of democrats crying about Biden's achievements lol. Let's pretend they do matter - what are they doing to fix people's perceptions that he's doing squat? Nothing. They're just banking on his "achievements" speaking for themselves instead of doing any EFFECTIVE propaganda to showcase their success.
I care less about the propaganda and more about reality. The reality is that the USSR got to space first. That's all. I don't see how correcting a misconception is cope.
Samsies. Apollo was the USA's only real "win". Dude's walking around on the moon is cool, it really is, but then sometimes i also look at the images from Venus, taken in 100 atmos of pressure, at 500 degrees, in a seething atmosphere of 300 km/h acid winds.
Idk if it's true, but i believe the soviets went to space to see what was up there, and the americans went to space because they saw sputnik overhead and felt terror in their hearts.
This meme is an effective piece of propaganda however. As you say perceptions were shaped to believe the us won, they can be changed.
This meme did a lot to radicalise teenage me, exactly because it highlighted how the only victory the us had, was the propaganda victory.
Let's pretend they do matter - what are they doing to fix people's perceptions that he's doing squat? Nothing. They're just banking on his "achievements" speaking for themselves instead of doing any EFFECTIVE propaganda to showcase their success.
Fuck Biden and his NON-achievments which can all be shown to be half measures at best or sheer bullshit lies at worst, unlike the many real and genuinely spectacular achievements of the USSR during the space race that they objectively won. The big difference in this rhetorical comparison is that the USSR isn't around anymore to even attempt a restoration or recognition of the epitome of real material human technological accomplishment they made. No one is "banking on their achievements" like they are for Biden's lies and no one except shitposters on a niche leftist site are doing "effective propaganda to showcase" the USSR's success. Only well researched history will do that now.