To each historical event its “one” of the Time. The American weekly, created in 1923, is famous for its effective covers and its “personalities of the year”. On the occasion of the war in Ukraine, triggered Thursday, February 24 by the invasion of the country by the Russian army, a new “one” was widely relayed on social networks. It is, however, a fake.
What is shared
Over the weekend following the start of the invasion of Ukraine, thousands of internet users rushed to share coverage of the Time dressing the face of Vladimir Putin with the mustache of Nazi Chancellor Adolf Hitler. In the title of this issue, dated from February 28 to March 7, we can read the title, under the tie of the Russian president: “The Return of History: How Putin Shattered Europe’s Dreams”.
On Twitter or on Facebook, this “one” was shared on Monday February 28 by dozens of different accounts. the tweet from Belarusian media Nexta presenting the “new cover of Time » alone has been re-shared more than 4,300 times.
Newest cover of the #TimeMagazine https://t.co/AjIirMUWSx
In France, the spokesperson for the National Rally (RN), Julien Odoul, also shared on Twitter this coverage by denouncing the “dumb cartoons” from “some journalists” who “throw gasoline into the fire”.
why is it wrong
A quick search will verify on the website of Time that their issue from February 28 to March 7, probably completed before the outbreak of war, is not devoted to Ukraine but to “kid of the year”Jean Orion, 11 years old.
The magazine Time did share a cover on February 25 devoted to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but this is a forthcoming issue (dated March 14-21) illustrated with a photo of a tank and not not a montage associating Putin with Hitler.
TIME’s new cover: How Putin shattered Europe’s dreams https://t.co/jXsRFKrW8B https://t.co/hDJs0ptJs0
The montage of photos, shared thousands of times on social networks, therefore takes up the “real title” of this future cover of the Timebut a detail made it possible to see that it was probably a fake: the photo credit located at the bottom right indicating « by Patrick Mulder ».
This Briton is indeed at the origin of this assembly. He had shared over the weekend his own “amateur” version coverage, considering “that the official choice lacked inspiration”. This graphic designer, who has little influence on Twitter (he had just over 1,500 subscribers on Monday and mainly shares photos of his dogs), published a video showing how he had made a second false “one” associating, this time, the eyes from Hitler to the face of Vladimir Putin. He also denied wanting “to make money” with this post.
This is the second edition of a rework I made of this month’s TIME magazine cover. I felt the official choice was s… https://t.co/8cbmBHbfWU
— MrPatrickMulder (@Patrick Mulder ????????????????????????????)
This is not the first time that a fake cover of the Time is massively relayed. In May 2021, a cartoon drawing a parallel between Adolf Hitler and Donald Trump was wrongly associated with the American magazine.