Memetics of Deception: Spreading Local Meme Hoaxes during COVID-19 1st Year

Abstract

The central thesis of this paper is that memetic practices can be crucial to understanding deception at present when hoaxes have increased globally due to COVID-19. Therefore, we employ existing memetic theory to describe the qualities and characteristics of meme hoaxes in terms of the way they are replicated by altering some aspects of the original, and then shared on social media platforms in order to connect global and local issues. Criteria for selecting the sample were hoaxes retrieved from and related to the local territory in the province of Alicante (Spain) during the first year of the pandemic (n = 35). Once typology, hoax topics and their memetic qualities were identified, we analysed their characteristics according to form in terms of Shifman (2014) and, secondly, their content and stance concordances both within and outside our sample (Spain and abroad). The results show, firstly, that hoaxes are mainly disinformation and they are related to the pandemic. Secondly, despite the notion that local hoaxes are linked to local circumstances that are difficult to extrapolate, our conclusions demonstrate their extraordinary memetic and “glocal” capacity: they rapidly adapt other hoaxes from other places to local areas, very often supplanting reliable sources, and thereby demonstrating consistency and opportunism.

Tipología y patrones de los bulos difundidos durante la pandemia de la COVID-19 sobre salud y nutrición

“…A pesar de los trabajos previos que han evaluado la calidad de los contenidos sobre salud y nutrición a través del ecosistema digital, a partir de la primera década del siglo XXI, en general estos no estuvieron centrados en estudiar la propagación y diseminación de rumores o engaños, sino más bien en identificar las falacias de autoridad, los reclamos de salud con estrategias de mercadotecnia o la promoción de enfermedades (Moreno-Castro, 2006;Fazio, 2009;Dean et al, 2012;Nan et al, 2013;Moreno-Castro, 2019). El fenómeno pandémico generó una circunstancia especial, que no se había producido hasta el momento; esto es, la instantaneidad y la fugacidad de la difusión de bulos a escala planetaria, generando de forma sincrónica efectos nocivos de toda naturaleza, que han abarcado desde problemas graves en la salud de las personas, hasta crisis políticas o económicas (Aghababaeian, Hamdanieh y Ostadtaghizadeh, 2020; Pérez-Curiel y Velasco-Molpeceres, 2020; Raj y Goswami, 2020;Rodríguez-Ferrándiz et al, 2021;Utomo y Prayoga, 2021).…”