Does the meme culture promote problematic narratives?
Mishaal Irfan
Topic : Digital World
Question/issue : Does the meme culture promote problematic narratives?
Word limit: 1997
Introduction
Topic : Digital World
Question/issue : Does the meme culture promote problematic narratives?
Word limit: 1997
Introduction
The meme culture has started to pick up heat. According to World Health Organization, depression is
one of the most common illnesses among children ageing from 10-19 years. (Kessler RC et al., 2020).
Consequently, they use memes as a coping mechanism.After a survey, conducted by Brigham Young
University, it was discovered that about 94% people believed that memes were used as a coping
mechanism. (Gabrielle Shiozawa, 2020) In Mexico, 73% of people between 18 and 24 years claimed to
have shared memes on social media. (Statista, 2020) While spreading comic relief, a lot of people with
biased ideas tend to inject those harmful ideas into the memes, and because these memers have a large
following, a lot of impressionable people get influenced. It contributes to the following issues:
Issue: Political Biases
Causes / Consequences
People have started to rely on memes to get news due to the media-bias along with lack of discourse of
the political campaigns by the main-stream media. (Helen Brown, 2022) Their swift creation and
distribution makes them imperative for spreading propaganda. Facebook claimed that some accounts
created echo chambers that manipulated political discussion with the more sensational opinion winning.
Political propagandists in order accelerate their political campaigns use memes to create such polarized
groups. The people are preyed through advertisement and the algorithms, thus groups get populated
with users quickly. People assume that as they are popular, they are credible and do not fact-check the
received information.(Joshua Nieubuurt, 2021)
Global Perspectives
Memes were used by the Russian President, Vladimir Putin to promote his political agenda. His
marketing team projected him as a strong leader through templates that showed him riding a horse
shirtless, swimming with dolphins and doing Judo. (Amanda and Jonny, 2015) Henceforth, his
government has made strict laws against the memes as they know how influential and dominating, they
can be. (Charli James, 2018) According to the legislation proposed by Vladimir, anyone who uploads
offensive content on the internet would have to face legal actions. Andrey was sentenced 5 years of jail
under Article 282 because he uploaded memes on Putin. (Even Greshovich, 2018)
Maria Motuznaya, was sentenced six years of jail for making memes in Russia. (Olga Robinson, 2018)
Memes were also used by Russian hackers to promote false narratives during the 2020 elections in
America. (Brooke Crothers, 2020) Brooke Crothers supports my argument, however, his views might be
one-sided as he works for an American based news agency.
Additionally, memes were used by the Russian government that greatly influenced the 2016, US
elections. Through the Internet Research Agency, they were able to manipulate the majority of the
people into voting Trump instead of Clinton. (Joan Donovan, 2019) Joan Donovan views might be biased
as his friend was a victim of the meme culture.
National Perspectives
When Pakistan and India had a political conflict in 2019—both the countries were on the verge of
nuclear war; the social media was filled with memes. Making jokes on a potential war. With tweets like,
“Pakistani and Indians who are not making memes at this critical time, do you even love your country?”
Taking a matter as grave as a war lightly and to an extent promoting the idea of war. (Elia Rathore,
2019) Their claim is strong as they have exposure and affiliation with various cultures, as they have lived
in 10 countries, removing any potential of biased statement.
During the 2018 Pakistan elections, the internet was filled with memes, accusing Imran Khan for the
election manipulation. People were calling out the army for supporting PTI unjustly. On the contrary,
there were memes on the Nawaz Sharif’s government, pointing towards his corruption. (Shivam Vij,
2018) Both the sides were extremists and promoted biased narratives.
Counter-Argument
However, not all memes spread bad political agenda. Memers have shed light at the Palestinian
massacre. Even a pro-Israeli blogger claimed that memes on Palestine were impactful and a danger to
the Israel’s dignity. (Aubrie Jaworowski, n.d.) Subreddits like (r/Izlam), (r/MarchAgainstNazis) and
(r/raimimemes) have brought up this issue through memes. Moreover, meme pages like (salthalal)
highlighted the ethnic cleansing that was going on in Palestine
Memes have played an imperative role in Australia’s politics to emphasise the rights of marginalised
Australians. Memes by activist groups like Blackfulla revolution (BRF) discuss the harm colonialism has
caused the indigenous people and how the current colonial policies of the state are unjust. The memes
discuss the segregation these people had to face and give the point of view of the aboriginal people.
Thus, adding to the Australian political discourse. (Frazer and Carlson , 2017)
Course of Action
We can let the government interfere to encourage legitimate news. We can use the government’s
funding. However, then the government would have the autonomy to censor memes according to their
need, taking away people’s right of freedom of speech. Government can also initiate critical thinking
programmes in schools to bring awareness among the students. This way, they will be able to distinguish
between fake news and real news. (Sandra and Rebecca, 2017)This discussion was held at the Yale
University and was accompanied by some of the most reputable people making this source trustworthy.
Moreover, Facebook has changed its policy. If any politician has a partnership with an influencer, the
meme has to clearly display that it has been sponsored by that politician. (Andrew Hutchison, 2020) It’s
a good initiative, as now the viewers would know whether it’s the perspective of the memer or a
perspective being enforced by a politician.
Issue: Sadistic Posting
Causes/Consequences
According to Sigmund Freud—a psychoanalyst and a philosopher—we use humour to represent our
repressed feelings. This may include spitefulness and is known as der Witz—the liberating of energy we
suppress. Der Witz might include putting another group or individual down through humorous remarks.
However, a contrary belief on humour is that it saves us from negativity and widens our perspective.
(John Morreall, 2012)
Some of these meme templates revolve around praising mass murderers like the New Zealand shooter.
They encourage toxic masculinity; a way to prove that you are ‘manly’ is by committing genocide.
(Ashley Mattheis, 2019)
Global Perspectives
"They're posting violent memes. They're encouraging each other to attack people and no one is doing
anything about it.’’—Emily, a Canadian who has been observing the Toronto incel group for several
years. Subsequently, leading to the “Toronto van attack”. (Jonathan Griffin, 2018) Alek Minassian, was
part of an incel group on Reddit. Before the attack on the van, he had praised a mass shooter—Elliot
Rodgers; another fellow incel. About 24 women became a victim of Alek’s rage in Toronto, 10 of them
were killed and 14 were severely injured. (“Toronto van attack”, 2018)
“The Boogaloo” meme posed threats of a potential civil war in America. It was an anti-government
movement started by Facebook groups. Memes on guns, combat techniques, how to kill the police and
government officials were shared. It also succeeded in drafting members of the US military. Aaron
Swenson was arrested by the Texas Police as he was live-streaming on Facebook while searching for a
cop to kill. He had a record of being part of many Boogaloo groups. This movement led to the killing of
many police-officers like Mr. Underwood. (Lois Beckett, 2021) This source is reliable as it had a hundred
day record of series of events with evidences that led to such consequences.
National Perspectives
After a woman was assaulted by a gang of men, Facebook groups like “Lumber One Dark Portion V2”,
started making memes on such a pressing matter. The group made memes on the r*pe culture,
paedophilia, violence and abuse. A bunch of minors ran the group! (Maryam Khalid, 2020). Sed Quershi
is the admin of groups that target women and harass them by raiding their personal Facebook profiles in
the name of ‘dank memes’. He harasses them and promotes violence against women and animals—a
video of him abusing a cat went viral. (Annam Lodhi, 2019) This source was infused with the testimony
of the victims of those groups, hence making it credible.
Counter-Argument
Memes are one of the most communicative languages and when used correctly bring us closer.
Subreddits like (r/HumansBeingBros) promote brotherhood through memes. Memes have helped
cricketers communicate with each other, nationally. Cricket admirer, Momin Saqib, became a global
meme after showing his frustration when Pakistan lost a match. This too communicated the emotions of
many Pakistanis. (Haiya Bokhari, n.d.) During the Covid-19, people turned towards memes to cope up
with the news. Most of the people during the pandemic were hungry for relatability, they had a lack of
familial feeling due to isolation and through collective shared interests, in this case humour, they found
comfort in knowing that other people were going through the same crisis. People also got to know news
through memes white staying at home. (Abrar Al-Heeti, 2020)
Course of Action
Social media has started regulating its content under section 230 of Communications Decency Act that
takes down accounts or flags content if they upload violent content, hate speech or sexually explicit
content. (Marta Vanegas, 2022) However, it gives tech-companies legal immunity as it’s the user that is
responsible if something offensive is uploaded and not them. It lets them take down content even if it is
constitutionally protected. Thus, much of the hateful content stays on the internet. Many people
believe that it needs to be reformed. (Ryan Tracy, 2021) The companies should be given a warning 24-48
hours after which legal action should be taken against them to increase deterrence. (Jemima Kelly,
2022)
Comparison of Causes and Consequences
People only using their social media accounts to get the news is the most impactful cause as they play in
the hands of politicians, who exploit these users into buying their political agenda. People expressing
their suppressed emotions through humour is a significant cause, nevertheless, it does not impact the
political affairs of a country. Politicians interfering into other country’s political affairs create chaos and
can be misleading. That said, the sadistic memes have influenced people commit hate crimes. However,
not all people involved end up committing them, but most of the political propaganda influences the
majority of the people’s voting.
“Dilma Rousseff and Aécio Neves most benefited from the production of persuasive memes during the
debates.”
They were two Brazilian political candidates. About 44.7% of persuasive memes were made on Neves
on his “ethical-moral rhetoric” and 28.9% were on his “critical rhetoric”. (Viktor el at., 2019) Hence,
leading him get a lot of votes. (Brazil election: Dilma Rousseff to face Aecio Neves in run-off, 2014)
Reflection
As a memer, myself, it was hard for me to digest how problematic the meme culture was. In my
experience, I saw a noteworthy difference in the perspective of local people and how the media
portrayed the meme culture. The media usually showed how callous the meme culture was, claiming it
promoted sexism, racism, Islamophobia, etc. Whereas, I observed that the majority of local people
believed that the meme culture helped them get knowledge and they used it as a coping mechanism. I
observed that people usually were in state of denial—denying deliberately an issue which they
witnessed almost every day on their social media accounts. “The Karen meme is everywhere-and it has
become mired in sexism”, The Guardian. (Ask Hadley, 2020)
Conclusion
The meme culture does promote biased and false narratives. Controversial topics, when warped with
humour, can form opinions and doubts, which has become a tactic used by propagandists. According to
Ohio State University, people tend to confuse satire with real news. According to Pearson social media is
jack of all trades, we can find news, memes and communicate with our friends. The shuffling of these
things makes it hard for people to differentiate between real and fake news. This source is reliable as he
is a professor and research associate in communication at The Ohio State University. (Jeff Grabmeier,2020).
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Posted Jun 21, 2024
Mishaal conducted a comprehensive study examining the effects of social media usage and memes that generate problematic narratives.
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