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Other pages, like ICU, have also tread this line carefully, being public about their support of the ruling LDF government’s decision to stand by the SC verdict, but still being critical of
that same government’s decision to state that it wouldn’t grant women “activists” police protection to enter the temple. Roshan Thomas, one of the founders of International Chalu Union, told
TNM, “Memes which mocked the silly politicisation attempts from local leaders to ministers in the state, as well as claims from namesake 'kings', were the highlight if this
period. I think those memes helped people understand deliberate attempts to make the issue worse.” ”We have in the past been threatened for publishing content which apparently hurt religious
sentiments. In Sabarimala, the issue was more of right to equality. We believe in equal rights irrespective of gender and sexuality and decided to openly support women's right to enter
the temple,” he added. CONTINUOUS SELF EXAMINATION Given how clear the ethos of meme pages are from the kind of posts they publish, some groups have seen internal rifts and splits along the
way as a result. The admins who run Troll Republic, for example, were once a part of another meme page, Troll Malayalam. A few erstwhile-admins of Troll Malayalam took objection to the kind
of misogynistic posts published by that page, and the difference in opinion led to a group of four or five admins from Troll Malayalam leaving the group to form a new page. Troll Republic
better expresses their feminist and progressive sensibility, the page’s admins said. A Troll Republic admin told TNM that given the huge platform that meme pages provide, they found it both
dangerous and irresponsible to post memes that don't adopt progressive values. GETTING CREATIVE TO STAY ‘POLITICALLY CORRECT’ In some situations, the sensitivity of the socio-political
issues being discussed actually inspires meme-makers to get creative, which actually adds an additional, elegant and sometimes inadvertent layer of humour to the memes that they post. ICU’s
admin told us that they sometimes make edits to memes to remove any direct references to certain people or groups. “We often try not to name people or political parties directly. We instead
post memes around the issue without naming them, but it’s clear who we are talking about.” So while the intention of meme makers in posting indirect jokes may be to immunise themselves from
criticism, controversy or a lawsuit, this practice actually makes jokes much more nuanced and creative, adding a layer of sophistication and finesse to the crafting of the joke itself. The
practice of making indirect jokes for fear of reprisal is adopted by citizens in many countries with heavy restrictions on freedom of speech, like China, North Korea and Egypt, where
political circumstances force jokes to be made in oblique ways, automatically making them more complex. But while such jokes may sometimes seem random or silly, there is no mistaking the
power of this kind of insidious humour: in 2016, North Korea’s Kim Jong-Un was so incensed by indirect jokes that he banned sarcasm about himself or his government in the country, while in
2014, China banned double-meanings, punning, and word play in radio and television broadcast to crack down on dissent. DISASTER, DEATH ARE NOT FUNNY Even pages that don’t espouse feminist or
progressive values directly, make judgement calls on the kinds of posts they share in trying times. An admin of Offensiven’t Malayalam Memes said, “During the floods, we did see many memes
about what was going on, and some were even funny, but we chose not to post those because it would have been too inhuman. Maybe we will share them later, when the situation is calm and is no
longer a disaster.” A Troll Republic admin also mentioned that during the Kerala floods, their page didn’t post memes at all, but in fact changed gears from jokes entirely to post public
service announcements and other posts that helped coordinate relief efforts. A Dank Memes Malayalam admin mentioned that despite the page posting a variety of memes on the Sabarimala issue,
they were careful not to post memes around the death of a Sabarimala Karma Samithi worker, Chandran Unnithan, in order not to stoke existing flames. WILLINGNESS TO LEARN FROM MISTAKES At
times when they get it wrong, admins say they are also willing to take down published posts that were in bad taste. In October, a racist ‘joke’ by Offensiven’t Malayalam Memes about the
Nigerian actor Samuel Robinson, the widely-loved actor in _Sudani from Nigeria_, for example, was taken down after the actor took grave objection. The admins met with the movie’s producers
to resolve the issue, following which they also posted a public apology. All of the meme page admins we spoke to also mentioned that their inboxes were full of abuse from people whom their
jokes and memes had offended, and that they weren’t bothered by it much any more. DMM’s admin takes a pragmatic view, and says that the posting of the memes, and the discussions and
reactions they spark, are part of an ongoing social change. “We have such a huge social media tool, with about one or one and a half lakh followers. One of our stories gets viewed by 50,000
people within 24 hours. So we don’t give our viewers data according to what they want, we give them the truth. We are not here for entertainment, we know it is a powerful tool, and using
apolitical avenues like Instagram and Facebook to educate people about crucial issues is important to us,” he said. “Using memes is a better way to reach a young target audience. People
share it, they laugh, they post comments, and which sparks political debates, and sometimes fights. This is a continuous process of social change, and we will persist,” he added.