The divorcee memes in the virtual field: Body discourse positioning as the object and enhancement of sexual image

Abstract

This article aimed to explore the positioning of divorcee status in divorcee memes. The divorcee meme template spread over the internet was used as the focus of the study. The researchers selected the divorcee memes in 2018, 2019, and 2020, totalling nine memes. The selection of divorcee memes was carried out on views representing the body's discourse as the dominant discourse. We examined the main discourse that develops in divorcee's memes relating to the body. By combining qualitative and quantitative analysis (n = 45 meme readers) based on Roland Barthes' theory, we examined the divorcee's position in the meme, the ideology attached to it, and the readers' views. Our findings showed the divorcee's position in the divorcee's meme as an object of gaze by using the body as the focus, thereby strengthening the stigma that divorcees are seductive women who always wait for men's presence. The entire divorcee meme showed the divorcee's position as a joke. However, from readers' responses, it can be concluded that the divorcee's meme is a myth that is built to perpetuate the negative stigma of divorcees. Finally, our findings suggest that internet users produce more critical and objective memes of empirical truth.