On August 22, Iryna Zarutska was murdered on a light rail train. On September 10, Charlie Kirk was shot and killed during a speech. In less than a month, these two tragedies in the United States shocked the nation and drew global attention.
There is no direct causal relationship between these two cases. However, as the "violent murder case" that garnered nationwide attention escalated into a "politicized event," it becomes difficult to discuss these two incidents separately.
In the cryptocurrency community, there was a surge of speculation around the meme coins $IRYNA and $CHARLIE related to these two cases. From the perspective of Chinese-speaking players, the understanding of these two tokens differs significantly from that of English-speaking players (especially those in the U.S. cryptocurrency community), leading to confusion. For example:
Isn't the impact of the Charlie Kirk case greater than that of Iryna Zarutska? Why is the highest market cap of $CHARLIE lower than that of $IRYNA?
Is the event that Musk and Trump both commented on not able to reach the heights of $PNUT because the on-chain market is not doing well?
By reviewing the fermentation process of these events and observing the huge controversies on Twitter, we may be able to provide answers to these questions from a more comprehensive perspective.
The case of Iryna Zarutska's murder occurred on August 22, but the $IRYNA token was not deployed until September 6. Moreover, on September 6 and 7, the highest market cap of $IRYNA did not even exceed $1 million.
If we search for discussions on Twitter after the incident, we will find that it had already attracted significant attention shortly after it occurred. On August 26, Musk replied to a related tweet, asking, "Why isn't the killer in prison?"
The main tweet Musk interacted with received over 37,000 retweets and 144,000 likes.
However, at this time, the surveillance footage of Iryna Zarutska's murder had not yet been disclosed, which explains the "vacuum period" between the incident and the token deployment. The surveillance video from the crime scene was released on September 6, Beijing time, and we subsequently saw related discussions on Twitter.
The above tweet was posted at 5 AM on September 6, Beijing time, but there were still over 10 hours until the token was deployed. During this smaller "vacuum period," the surveillance footage from the crime scene was shared on Twitter and quickly gained traction.
On September 7, when asked about the case, Trump called it "horrific" and promised to fully grasp the situation. On September 8, during a speech at the Bible Museum in Washington, D.C., Trump linked the case to his plans to send federal agents and the National Guard to Chicago and other Democrat-controlled cities. In addition to expressing condolences to the victim's family, he stated, "Evil people are out there, and if we can't deal with it, our country will cease to exist."
Trump also posted on Truth Social, "The blood of this innocent woman drips from the killer's knife, and now her blood is on the hands of those Democrats who refuse to put bad people in prison."
In this post, he also targeted Roy Cooper, calling him a "former powerless governor" and "someone who wants to be a senator." Of course, Trump doesn't insult without a purpose; the post ends with a call to support Republican Michael Whatley.
At this point, the incident had transformed from an independent violent murder case into a politicized event.
For the $IRYNA token, it is counterintuitive that Trump's influence on its price performance may not be as significant as Musk's.
From the K-line chart, we can see that the highest trading volume occurred at 3 PM on September 10, with a volume close to $17 million, and the token's market cap surged from $9.5 million to nearly $34 million.
It was at 3 PM on September 10 that Musk stated on Twitter that he was willing to donate $1 million to support the creation of murals for Iryna Zarutska in major cities across the U.S.
However, on the evening of September 10, when the White House's official Twitter account also posted Trump's statement calling for the death penalty for Iryna's murderer, the $IRYNA market showed no reaction.
About three hours after the White House tweet, Charlie Kirk was shot. Approximately two hours later, Trump announced Charlie Kirk's death.
The Iryna case transitioned from an independent violent murder case to a politicized process, while the case of Charlie Kirk's murder was destined to be a "political assassination" from the start. This is because Charlie Kirk himself is a right-wing political figure in the U.S. Without elaborating too much on Charlie Kirk's political influence, we can sense it from the reactions following the incident—Utah Governor Spencer Fox characterized the case as a "political assassination," Trump ordered the U.S. flag to be flown at half-mast for four days in mourning, and political leaders from other countries, including the British Prime Minister, Israeli Prime Minister, and Argentine President, expressed their condolences on social media…
After the news of the Charlie case broke, $IRYNA quickly plummeted by 50% within half an hour, dropping from a market cap of nearly $18 million to around $9 million. Since then, $IRYNA has not been able to regain its upward momentum, and its current market cap is about $900,000.
However, the funds chasing $CHARLIE have not been able to replicate the market cap heights of $IRYNA; the highest market cap of $CHARLIE has never exceeded $20 million, and its current market cap is only about $260,000.
After clarifying the sequence of events, we will attempt to answer the questions raised at the beginning of the article—why, with such a significant "hot topic," was it unable to take off?
Incomparable Political Memes
Some players have compared $CHARLIE to $PNUT, as both involve political relevance and discussions. However, there are several inappropriate aspects to this comparison.
First is the "difference in the subject of death." While the tragedy of animal deaths may evoke sympathy and even dissatisfaction with the political status quo, it ultimately does not touch upon the "sanctity" of human life. The manner of death also plays a role; the euthanasia of the squirrel in $PUNT contrasts sharply with the horrific and brutal imagery of Charlie Kirk being shot—bullets struck Charlie's neck, and blood gushed out instantly.
The debate over "blood money" has already occurred in the Chinese-speaking community, previously surrounding the meme coin $AI171 related to the crash of Air India Flight 171.
Secondly, the timing of the Charlie case coincided with the peak interest in the Iryna case, during a period when the emotional divide and conflict in American society were at a relatively high point—an experience of "national trauma" that players from the Chinese-speaking community across the ocean find difficult to grasp.
How intense is the emotional divide and conflict in American society? Here we can refer back to a point made at the beginning of the article, that the Iryna case and the Charlie case are not directly causally related, but it is also difficult to discuss the two cases separately.
Charlie Kirk has a very clear stance on the Iryna case; he believes it is related to racial issues. He not only frequently tweeted about the Iryna case but also engaged in a heated exchange with CNN political commentator Van Jones.
Charlie Kirk supports his viewpoint with a statement made by the killer in the surveillance footage of the Iryna case, where the killer said, "I got that white girl." The backlash against this statement has led to severe anti-Black sentiment on Twitter. Searching for the keyword "TND" reveals numerous related tweets, some of which have gained significant traction.
"We might see TND happen before the release of GTA 6."
The original meaning of "TND" is highly racist, standing for "Total N* Death." Radical American Twitter users, after the Iryna case, have used "TND" or "Totally Nice Day" to express such racist sentiments to avoid being banned by Twitter.
In this environment, any arguments defending the meme coins seem weak. When $IRYNA was rising, there were voices saying, "$IRYNA provides donations to the victim's family." But by the time of $CHARLIE, the English-speaking community was almost entirely accusing "$CHARLIE of being blood money," and the only remaining defense was, "This is the meme coin market; you can choose not to speculate, but the market is like this," which hardly qualifies as a rebuttal.
"If you are promoting, issuing tokens, or trying to profit from the hype surrounding the murders of Iryna and Charlie, then you are a very shameful and detestable person." This tweet received over 2,200 likes, and there are many similar tweets.
Even some KOLs in the English-speaking community faced backlash for their "clever" remarks related to these two cases. The most notable example is Rasmr, whose token $rasmr dropped about 30% after he posted the following tweet.
"There should be a live stream where the murderer of Iryna's case kills the murderer of Charlie's case." Rasmr has since deleted this tweet.
Lexapro also faced criticism for tweeting, "I am a (trading) profiteer of racial conflict and violence." Lexapro has also deleted this tweet. From the screenshot below, it can be seen that Lexapro previously displayed an affiliate badge for the meme coin trading app Padre, but Padre has now removed Lexapro from its affiliate accounts.
Thus, in the English-speaking community, $IRYNA and $CHARLIE are largely boycotted on moral grounds, which goes far beyond the realm of "hot speculation."
Finally, the $CHARLIE token was deployed immediately after the news of Charlie Kirk's murder broke, unlike $PNUT, which had some time buffer allowing the hype to cool down, making the speculation on related meme coins somewhat acceptable. This led to $CHARLIE being criticized by the public in the same way that merchants who speculated on mask prices at the onset of the pandemic were criticized; no one would consider whether this was "reasonable speculation" at that moment; everyone would just feel it was "cold and ruthless."
As for the poor on-chain market conditions or major exchanges like Binance and OKX no longer listing Solana meme coins, these may still be secondary reasons. Especially regarding the lack of listings for Solana memes on CEXs, the reaction in the English-speaking community, combined with the severity of the political events involved, makes it difficult for major exchanges to list either $IRYNA or $CHARLIE.
It can be said that $IRYNA evolved from an initial "hot token" to a "political token," and with the occurrence of the Charlie Kirk case, $CHARLIE became involved in a certain degree of "political correctness." The situations of these two tokens are unprecedented since last year's meme coin bull market, and the significant differences in perspectives between the Chinese-speaking community across the ocean and the English-speaking community (especially American players) have led to huge discrepancies in understanding and price performance.
Even if we say this is "humanitarian concern" caused by "political correctness," I hope that "humanitarian concern" can become a principle in the meme coin market from now on.
So many things happen in this world every day, whether they are fortunate good events or painful tragedies. The murders of Iryna and Charlie, aside from politics, remind us that life and death are indifferent, and we never know when death will come.
When tragedy strikes, we are first and foremost living human beings, and only secondarily cryptocurrency players. There are so many things to participate in for speculation; why should we be fixated on life and death?
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