Disinfolklore describes both a phenomenon and an analytical method. As a phenomenon, it is the weaponisation of folklore-like archetype laden stories structures to manipulate populations. As a method, it is a twelve-tool framework for detecting, decrypting, and defeating that manipulation.
The term was coined in February 2023 by Stephen Scott Douglas, a diplomat who spent seven years in Russia-occupied eastern Ukraine watching how folklore-like stories were manufactured to justify genocide.
The Definition
At its simplest, Disinfolklore is a narrative form that I discovered characterises most effective items of disinformation, misinformation and other means of manipulating us into behaviours we would not otherwise engage in.
Source: Book Proposal
Disinfolklore, as an analytical method, enables us to perceive how those seeking to manipulate us use archetypes immanent in ordinary-seeming stories to create contemporary legends masquerading as, for example, news or political speech.
Source: Disinfolklore (Framework)
Disinfolklore is not simply “fake news” or “propaganda.” It describes how the deepest structures of human storytelling — archetypes, folk characters, fairy-tale logic — are reverse-engineered and deployed as weapons. The same narrative mechanisms that created democratic nations in the nineteenth century are now being used to destroy the post-World War Two international order.
How the Term Was Coined
The folder on my computer which I used as a library for the (by 2023) thousands of texts I had studied on Russian disinformation, trolling and trolls was called “Folklore.” When, around February 13, 2023, I suddenly saw how the term “Disinfo” melded with “folklore” I knew immediately I had the perfect signifier for the narrative form that I had already noticed was common to Russian combat propaganda and Trumpian memetic warfare techniques.
Source: Book Proposal
The first tweet went viral — over 800,000 views:
As a diplomat operating inside Russia-occupied eastern Ukraine (2015-2022), I coined the term “Disinfolklore.” Disinfolklore describes a type of emotion-moving propaganda that uses stories / tales / memes as a strategic means of manipulating its consumers, through inducing fear.
Source: Twitter (February 2023)
Where the Insight Came From
In 2015 I had just arrived in eastern Ukraine to work as a diplomat. My job was to secure the safe passage of civilians over a bridge in a forest that divided Russia-occupied Ukraine from the rest of the country. Even in my first moments at that spot (where I was to spend three years), I intuited that there was something folklore about the situation.
Source: Book Proposal
Standing on a bridge over the Donets river in eastern Ukraine, the author recognised that Russian combat propaganda was not random disinformation. It had the structure of fairy tales: stock characters (the Mother and the Maiden), archetypal settings (the Cottage in the Woods), and emotional logic designed to bypass rational analysis. It took eight years for that intuition to crystallise into a full analytical framework. Read the full story in Origins of the Concept.
How Disinfolklore Works
Disinfolklore operates through archetypes — the deep narrative patterns that enter our minds in childhood through fairy tales, myths, and folk stories. These archetypes create cognitive lenses through which we interpret reality.
It was as if someone had a manual containing all of the primordial archetypes and they had constructed the story to ensure it contained these elements. In that moment, I had discovered how Russia and MAGA purposely and purposefully reverse-engineer tales with faery and folk-tale like emotional resonances as a means of hacking minds.
Source: Rearchetyping
Today, the fabric of every aspect of our lives — our work, our health, whether we believe vaccines work, that Global Warming is happening or that it can be mitigated, our minds, communities, how we perceive the advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI), our household finances, close relationships, the art we consume, our children’s futures, our dreams, nightmares, natural environment, even the bond market — is permeated with story-borne artefacts (Disinfolklore) of an entirely planned attempt to rebuild human culture.
Source: Book Proposal
The mechanism works through Mana — the energy or intention inside every meme. Disinfolklore manipulates us (literally: shakes our Mana) by implanting archetypes that alter our Moods, Intentions, Attitudes, and Motivations without our awareness.
The Scope: Not Just Russia
‘Disinfolklore’ initially described the mind-hacking stories that Russia was propagating. Gradually, though, I realised that the scope of Russia’s falsification of reality extended from the micro / quotidian to the macro / deep history.
Source: Book Proposal
The framework applies to any community that weaponises narrative at scale:
- Russian Disinfolklore — the original case study: Russian Disinfolklore
- MAGA Disinfolklore — Druidey Don as Shaman-Trickster: MAGA Galaxy
- Brexit Disinfolklore — the Great Migration Troll applied to the UK: Brexit
- CCP Disinfolklore — anti-Western narrative warfare: CCP Disinfolklore
When these individual Disinfolklore Galaxies concatenate, they form the Disinfolklore Universe — the reality-distortion field we all now inhabit.
The Twelve Tools: How to Fight Back
The author developed a complete analytical method — The Twelve Tools — for detecting and defeating Disinfolklore:
Detection (Tools 1-5): Recognise the archetypes, scan with Troll Radars, identify the Mana in the Meme, map the Inner/Outer Realm division, and trace the Trigger-Experience-Reaction chain.
The Bridge (Tool 6): Apply the Code of Positive Trolls — six evaluative criteria from The Six Perfections to classify any meme as Positive, Negative, or Neutral.
Adjudication (Tools 7-12): Generosity, Right/Ethical Discipline, Mana/Energy, Patience, Mindfulness, and Insight/Wisdom — the six-point algorithm that enables us to build resilience to manipulation.
The Positive Vision
Disinfolklore is not just a diagnostic framework. It is a constructive one:
Counter-Disinfolklore (activity) → Code of Positive Trolls (instrument) → Adjudication (verdict) → Rearchetyping (transformation) → Infolklore (output)
The same archetypal mechanisms that are weaponised can be used to protect communities, rebuild shared understanding, and create Infolklore — the positive twin of Disinfolklore.
Key Takeaways
- Disinfolklore is a narrative form, not just false claims — it operates through the same structures as fairy tales and folk stories
- It was discovered in the field by a diplomat who spent seven years in Russia-occupied eastern Ukraine
- It works through archetypes — deep narrative patterns that hack our minds below the threshold of conscious awareness
- It is not limited to Russia — MAGA, Brexit, CCP, and anti-vax communities all deploy Disinfolklore
- There is a method to defeat it — the Twelve Tools provide a complete detection and adjudication framework
- It has a positive twin — Infolklore, the constructive use of the same narrative mechanisms
Go Deeper
- Disinfolklore vs Disinformation — why fact-checking alone cannot defeat this
- Origins — the full origin story
- The Twelve Tools — the complete analytical method
- What Is Mana? — the energy concept at the heart of the framework
- Beginner’s Path — start learning the framework step by step