As such, Deus Vult grew into a historical catchphrase intended to align people into recapturing the Holy Land.
Back in 1095, Pope Urban II requested help for the Eastern Orthodox Church to defend himself from the Seljuk invasion of Anatolia. It is used essentially as the christian version of the meme "Remove Kebab".Deus Vult, or ‘God wills it’, arose as the rallying cry of soldiers of the First Crusade. The current surge of Deus Vult does not seem to be part of CK2, but part of a growing hatred for islamification, proved by simply reading the comments that come with that phrase. You can look for Deus Vult being used in other places in much the same way to refer to anti-islamic beliefs. Whether or not that sounds like its said in context of CK2 is up to you. "A new order of Knights Templar is needed once again to fight the Islamic hordes plaguing western civilization." "I think its about time we went on another crusade." "RIP FRANCE, RIP ENGLAND overflowed with muslims" "As an atheist, I would gladly go on a Crusade with my Christian brothers to get rid of this Islamic plague. Killing innocent christians for hundreds of years and when finally the pope calls upon people to finally put an end to it, they bitch and moan to this day they blame us, even now muslims will kill thousands and still say christianity is still dangerous" "Muslims have always been self proclaimed victims. "We will never let our Europe turn into 3rd world shithole! We will never accept Sharia Law! CRUSADE NOW!! DEUS LO VULT!!!!" "And centuries later, their descendants gave Europe away for nothing so they wouldn't be called racists. Let's look at what the people say along with it. As you can see, there is a lot of use for this phrase here.
Here are a few examples of this phrase being used: (I apologize as in some of these you might have to scroll down a bit)Ĭontrol+f. Perhaps it helped popularize the phrase, but other than that it has nothing to do with CK2. Urban urged military support for the Byzantine Empire and its Emperor, Alexios I, who needed reinforcements for his conflict with westward migrating Turks in Anatolia.Īs you have asked in your question, which showed no sources as to Deus Vult being used recently, (don't worry I got you covered), it is indeed gained use, which I will prove in just a moment.Ĭrusader Kings has been out for a good while (3 years) so the current surge in its use has nothing to do with the game. The First Crusade arose after a call to arms in a 1095 sermon by Pope Urban II. So what do you think, ERA? Is there anything off about 'Deus Vult!'ĭeus Vult (Classical Latin for "God wills it") was the cry of the people at the declaration of the First Crusade by Pope Urban II at the Council of Clermont in 1095 when the Eastern Orthodox Church requested help in defense from the Seljuk invasion of Anatolia. They also posited that the meme really only rose back into prevalence due to 4chan, who has a history of racist caricatures anyways.
The Anti-Vulter, to continue the terminology, claimed that the Crusades against Muslims were magnitudes more significant than any others, plus the history wouldn't have become memetic without the rise of anti-Muslim sentiments in the wake of the Iraqi War. His argument was that plenty of white pagan religions were crusaded against too, and it's just a harmless reference. The Pro-Vulter, so to speak, said that it's in no way racist and just based on Crusades alone. I'm still formulating how I feel about it, but I admit the meme's always sat a little oddly with me, especially when the only context I see it used so heavily is usually rapidly followed by 'Saracen hordes' and the like. Do you think the whole screaming 'DEUS VULT!' is a little gross? Maybe not necessarily racist (or maybe so), but just sort of tasteless? Partially because of videogames, but not really related enough to post it there I think. I'm a little torn, as I think both of my friends made some good points. I had a convo with a couple of friends on this earlier and thought I'd get ERA's input on it.