Never Forget What You're Fighting For

Submission 12,031

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About

"Never Forget What You're Fighting For" is a photoshop exploitable image macro that depicts the POV of a soldier looking at a photo on the inside of his helmet, implying that the person or entity depicted in the picture is the soldier's motivation and comfort for their continued military service. In memes, the image is typically swapped to one that is humorous in nature.

Origin

The original photo's origin is unknown; it is first known to have appeared online in 2012,^[1] circling around in social networks. Initial edits to the picture were not of humorous nature and instead reflected further on the life of a soldier.^[2]

The first meme edits of the picture appeared in 2016, depicting anime girls.^[4] One such example was posted on September 9th, 2016, by Redditor u/buggr to the /r/justneckbeardthings^[3] subreddit (seen below, left), receiving 220 upvotes and 44 comments in six months.

Spread

Subsequent edits in the following years were often titled with the catchphrase "never forget what you're fighting for," such as a Ken Bone edit (seen below, left).^[5] Other variations soon emerged where the picture depicted oil pumps, implying that wars are fought over oil and natural resources — such as a version posted on April 12th, 2018, that gained 18,000 points in six months (seen below, right).^[6]

Alternative version

On September 24th, 2020, an artwork with a similar vein was published, featuring Lily from AT&T as the object of motivation (shown below, left).^[7] An oil edit of it (shown below, right) gained 23,000 points in six months.^[8]