I find the interpretation of the event to be interesting. The atlas obscura link here and the Wikipedia link in the other HN thread both make it sound like the

I find the interpretation of the event to be interesting. The atlas obscura link here and the Wikipedia link in the other HN thread both make it sound like the intention was to be a hoax, to make people believe something false. But most of the Russian observers of the actual event that are commenting here say it hardly "fooled" anyone, it was just funny. I wonder if the show was meant more as satire or parody, as in "let me make fun of the stuff they used to feed us on TV, now that access to media is more open." So it would've been a very self-aware performance, aimed at an audience that was attuned enouh to pick up on the humor. The cognitive dissonance of the mushroom Lenin was a parody of the years of cognitive dissonance from the official propaganda on tv. I'm not sure where the hoax interpretation comes from. The atlas obscura article seems mostly sourced from Wikipedia, or vice versa, it's hard to tell. Calling it a hoax may be more of a western misinterpretation, one that reveals a bias in believing the Russian public was unsophisticated and easily fooled. Also sometims truth is stranger than fiction. Nature's prior art is a mushroom that takes over ants: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophiocordyceps_unilateralis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophiocordyceps_unilateralis The following article explains how the game The Last of Us expands this concept until human victims turn into mushrooms: https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/but-not-simpler/the-fungus-that-reduced-humanity-to-the-last-of-us/ https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/but-not-simpler/the-fun...