Imlisanen Jamir
Memes are everywhere.
Under the cloak of internet anonymity, cultural and political discourse in the online world these days has hitched itself on a crass and blunt medium.
The term “meme” was used first by evolutionary biologist and fervent rationalist, Richard Daw kins in his book ‘The Selfish Gene.’ He used the term to refer to “... a unit of cultural transmission, or a unit of imitation” in the context of comparing human cultures to genetic models.
This definition fits very well even today; strange considering how memes continue to evolve on an exponential rate, in terms of days and even hours.
Facebook, which is the most popular social media platform in Nagaland, has close to a hundred meme pages that dedicate their content to crass and dark humor as a means to convey statements on social and political realities in the local context, or in many cases just for the heck of it (the ‘lulz’ as they say).
Whether it be the realities of backdoor appointments portrayed in caricaturized images playing with the lines of tribalism; misogynist images spewing bigoted ideas; or downright obscene portrayals of individuals and communities; memes have begun to infiltrate our consciousness.
In a society that seems to have a dodgy relationship with satire, irony or even humour in general, the space that young Nagas occupy in the internet is surreal. On the one hand, there is a generation of young people that engage in an unfiltered meme culture to participate in social discourse, even if unwittingly. There are also those that just can’t take a joke, and want every meme creator to be jailed under the ridiculous defamation law. Then, there are the ones who at least attempt to strike a balance between the two.
While, memes make us laugh or roll our eyes, sometimes they also do something else: they inform us. Unfortunately, they have become more politically significant that they ought to or were even started to be.
The danger lies in the fact that small lies told for the sake of humor can be accidentally taken for truths. Imagine what audiences can be made to think if the so-called joke is actually created specifically to spread a falsehood. That is not to say that the internet is being overwhelmed with untrue memes, or that there is some conspiracy afoot, but the danger remains.
However, the images transcend the notion of wording transposed on funny images; they summarize a culture fraught with political fatigue. Memes don’t circulate because they’re true. They circulate because they’re funny. They’re about appropriating the culture around us and short-circuiting meanings. As The New Yorker put it, “maybe at their best, memes bring power or celebrity or influence down to the level of the crowd.”
So the next time you receive a meme, recognize them as either parody, be offended by it or just laugh; but never as an active source of real information.
Comments can be sent to imlisanejamir@gmail.com
