Power of memes – The Manila Times

Read this in The Manila Times digital edition.

IT is quite interesting to see the creative juices of Filipinos during this campaign. With social media acting as a gatekeeper to each camp and mainstream media covering the perceived candidates, a lot of optics are being made to corner the undecideds and to influence those who are fence-sitting, going into the campaign period. With 88 million Filipinos on the Facebook platform, campaigns are now understanding what digital campaigning is.

To start with, a candidate without a relational database is uncompetitive. A candidate who has not done his or her election history analysis is like going to the forest in search of the opening that one can't see because one does not understand the terrain. Ground is important even in digital because one can link each terrain in push-and-pull fashion.

Digital campaigning means the production of publicity materials and videos as a means to reach voters. The tactics of seeding, spreading and converting are the three steps one has to perform in order to enhance engagement. Engagement is a "formula that measures the amount of interaction social content earns relative to reach or other audience figures. This can include reactions, likes, comments, shares, saves, direct messages, mentions, click-throughs and more." Engagement can be measured, in fact there is a formula to determine engagement. The higher the engagement, the more traction and conversion takes place. Using applications on the other hand can be tools for organizations and an effective electronic organization means an easy way of downloading and sharing information.

The Oxford Dictionary defines a meme as "an element of culture that may be considered to be passed on by non-genetic means, especially imitation." In his landmark book, The Selfish Gene, author Richard Dawkins coined the word meme to describe cultural replicators which spread through the social body akin to how genes spread through the biological body. Memes form the invisible but very real DNA of human society. A meme is essentially an idea, but not every idea is a meme. In order for an idea to become a meme it must be passed on, or replicated to another individual. Much like a virus moves from body to body, memes move from mind to mind. Just as genes organize themselves into DNA, cells and chromosomes, so too do replicating elements of culture organize themselves into memes, and co-adaptive meme complexes or "memeplexes." The study of these replicating elements of culture is known as memetics.

Memes pushed by technology have reached more people and at a faster clip. A meme is an idea that can "evolve" over time, and eventually influence culture. Memes are often associated with funny pictures overlaid with text. Yet the "concept goes much deeper, and can be anything from music, to movies, to words and their perceived meanings." Often, what is not easy to reveal is clearly seen in a different light.

Memetic warfare is availed of in the various narratives in creative fashion to dull the intent and come out comedic. It would seem innocuous or provide a lighter moment for engagement but if one deep dives into such meme, one understands that the ordinariness is actually pointed to influence people and to highlight what is not obvious or what the creator is unable to say because it might be construed as a personal attack to a sitting official of the land.

Memetic warfare is a weaponized use of memes to intentionally introduce ideas into society, packaged in a way that allows them to spread, with a goal to alter the culture and perceptions of a targeted population. There is manufactured thought which is now being peddled in creation of certain narratives.

Digitized influence operations have become the new norm for controlling the electoral process, public opinion and narrative." And as we have seen, "the cyber war has moved beyond the battlefield into an all-encompassing struggle in economics, politics and culture, along with old-school physical confrontation."

A goal of memetic warfare isn't to alter reality, but instead to alter the perceived reality the perception that one is leading the pack becomes the main driver. There is manufactured thought and perception warfare and these are all felt in the current campaign season we have today. Take the case of a certain candidate whose supporters are changing the results of a survey and peddling it as the "real survey," distributed to all supporters via various applications and shared to all supporters.

Another presidential candidate hits up shadows to land the headline and be part of the news arc. Still another would distribute money, reasoning out that it is being done pre-campaign, memes and videos are treated separately since that was the time when the candidate was not yet into presidential politics.

So, who is the presidential candidate who is not weak? Who used cocaine? Why launch an attack against all candidates? Simple, because the endorsed has no traction? Or are the people asking him to start standing alone and not rely so much on the incumbent? But how do you pivot in such a framing? Use memes, and people will be able to push it, sharing it to all and ensuring the messaging reaches those that need to be engaged. And this is the way some are making their point heard without hurting the old man. The optics are very visual from the united camp while the optics of the incumbent seems to be all loud noise.

The memes will be here to stay and we will see more and more memes as we hit the campaign period because the very institution of the presidency is involved.

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Power of memes - The Manila Times