Imran Khan, the former prime minister of Pakistan, during an interview in Lahore, Pakistan, on June 2. Betsy Joles/Bloomberg via Getty Images hide caption
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Betsy Joles/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Imran Khan, former prime minister of Pakistan, during an interview in Lahore, Pakistan, on June 2.
Betsy Joles/Bloomberg via Getty Images
LAHORE, Pakistan — Internet humor related to the current political situation in Pakistan — after former Prime Minister Imran Khan conflict last month against the ruling party and the powerful military establishment — is ubiquitous.
For Pakistanis, during a highly charged time in their country’s history, the humorous content serves as both an emotional release and a subtle way to criticize the polarized political scene and its actors. The memes capture the exasperation of Pakistani citizens involved in overlapping crises and highlight the evolution of political commentary in a country where expression is often tightly controlled.
On May 9, Khan was arrested in an ongoing corruption case, triggering a wave of riots by supporters who saw his arrest as politically motivated. Demonstrators Army installations burned – including the house of the Lahore Corps Commander.
Pakistan’s leadership has characterized these acts as an attack against the state. Many protesters have been arrested, some booked on terrorism charges or handed over to specialized military courts. The Supreme Court later held that Khan’s arrest, carried out by paramilitary forces, was illegal.
Since May 9, the internet has exploded with memes, TikTok videos and Instagram reels chronicling days of protests and arrests and making jokes about the scenes that unfolded.
one widely shared meme sums up the dizzying effects of the current situation. In a format that often reappears in Pakistan, it shows a group of men dancing to a Pakistani pop hit from the early 2000s, “Nach Punjaban”. The camera pans between dancers depicting different aspects of the scene surrounding Khan’s May 9 arrest: Internet shutdowns, a bottle of ketchup stolen from an army general’s home, a Khan in wheelchair appearing in court.
The footage captures the chaotic pace of the Pakistani news cycle, and the number of dancers jammed into a small room parallels the information overload felt by the country’s social media users as they follow a single momentous political event.
The visual humor of Pakistan memes is instant and direct
Despite heavy censorship and periods of military dictatorship, humor in Pakistan has always found its way. Visual humor plays an important role in conveying political messages, says longtime artist and cartoonist Sabir Nazar, based in Lahore. “You can’t control the image. It has a kind of subversive quality,” he says.
A cartoon recently published by Sabir Nazar shows a boot weighing a scale with Imran Khan on the other side. Courtesy of Sabir Nazar hide caption
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Courtesy of Sabir Nazar
One of Nazar’s recent cartoons shows Imran Khan holding onto a scale while a large boot, which resembles one from an army uniform, weighs on the other side. Another cartoon shows a structure labeled “state” with broken pillars, engulfed in flames.
Much of the humor captures an understanding of the issues of justice, human rights and democracy in Pakistan, which has not held elections since Khan was ousted from power in a no-confidence vote last year.
“Memes in Pakistan often have a lot of scathing political currency,” he says Ahmer Naqvi, a writer in Karachi focusing on pop culture in Pakistan. The meme format lends itself well to Pakistani humor, he says, because it captures the multi-layered reality of social and political issues while avoiding censorship. “This form of expression is anonymous. It’s very direct. And it allows you to make some social comment.”
It’s called an anonymous Instagram account catboy_jinnah, run by a college student from Karachi who hides his identity to avoid online abuse, it enjoys poking fun at politics, alongside more innocuous posts that capture the humor and charm of everyday life in Pakistan. However, sometimes the underlying context of posts is more serious.
A post from May incorporates a shot of men sitting on a sofa holding a portrait of Pakistan’s founder Muhammad Ali Jinnah, while a raging fire is seen behind them.
Catboy_jinnah keeps his personal views on social and political issues veiled. “Irony is more dangerous,” he says, referring to the potential of satirical humor to challenge political and social ideas.
Humor allows for social commentary while evading censorship
Internet content related to current events in Pakistan proliferates despite a restrictive environment. A few hours after the arrest of Khan, the Pakistani the government shut down the country’s mobile broadband, limiting access to social networking sites, such as Twitter, YouTube and Facebook. (The content continued to be posted and shared on TikTok.) Internet users used VPN to share protest memes.
Police arrest a supporter of former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan in Lahore, Pakistan, Wednesday, May 10, 2023. KM Chaudary/AP hide caption
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KM Chaudhary/AP
Police arrest a supporter of former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan in Lahore, Pakistan, Wednesday, May 10, 2023.
KM Chaudhary/AP
According to the American organization Freedom House, Pakistani Internet users are facing numerous barriers to access, including Internet shutdowns and government regulations that dictate what content can be posted online. Pakistan Telecommunication Authority tin regulate or prohibit content that it considers anti-Islamic, a threat to public order and security or contrary to decency and morality. Internet regulations extend to the media, which were banned by media regulator pakistan in March of the broadcast of Khan’s speeches.
More recently, direct mentions of Khan all but disappeared from mainstream media coverage in Pakistan after the country’s Electronic Media Regulatory Authority issued a directive related to the people involved in the protests.
Nazar, the artist, began creating political cartoons as an art student in Lahore more than 40 years ago, during the rule of military dictator General Muhammad Zia ul-Haq, who unleashed extreme levels of censorship after impose martial law in the 1970s. “There was a kind of void for humor and satire was not [just] in journalism, but in all of society,” says Nazar.
During this time, comedy found a way to break censorship, even through programs on state television. fifty fiftya sketch comedy show inspired by Saturday Night Live, relied on satire, slapstick and irony to highlight political and social issues such as police brutality and government repression.
Political humor found its way further into mainstream television in the decades after Zia’s rule, when private news channels came into operation and leeway to broadcast comedy shows — even those that made jokes about political figures — along with more direct political talk.
Memes help Pakistanis cope with overlapping crises
This comic culture took on a new life with the Internet, especially among Pakistanis under the age of 30, who make up the majority of the population. Many of them were first attracted to Imran Khan’s PTI party for its dominance of social media and were among those who gathered to protest last month in defense of the party leader.
PTI official website has one dedicated meme page to re-share Internet posts by Khan supporters and the party sometimes shares memes on its own channels. PTI’s official Instagram account recently posted a meme based on a scene in Spiderman where Peter Parker, the Spiderman character, stops a subway car from derailing by holding it up with his body. In the meme, the train is labeled Pakistan and Spiderman is Imran Khan.
Memes can also serve as a coping method for Pakistanis facing overlapping political, economic and climate crises, says Sahar Habib Ghazi, a Karachi-based journalist who often posts on social and political issues. Instagram account, 2030mama. “We have a lot of community tools when it comes to managing trauma,” she says, “and a great way to share trauma is through humor.”
Last month, Habib Ghazi created one meme of a then PTI leader, Shireen Mazari, scolded by her daughter for trying to show a sign of victory after being released from an Islamabad jail.
About a week after his release, Mazari announced that he was leaving the PTI and politics altogether, citing the well-being of his family as a factor in his decision. Dozens of other former PTI leaders they have also resigned in recent weeks, and some have joined a newly created party. These decisions, which Khan attributes to outside pressure, have left him increasingly isolated.
More than a month after Khan’s arrest, the space for public dissent among his supporters has narrowed significantly as the government moves forward with trials for people it believes were involved in the destruction of property state
For the creator behind a meme and digital art Instagram account,_digink_, this environment is an impediment to publishing publications on political issues. “People have warned me several times not to do political things,” he says. She doesn’t want NPR to identify her and keeps her Instagram anonymous because she received threats for past posts.
Meanwhile, other social media users have moved to take subtle jabs at the crackdown on PTI and its supporters, making veiled jokes about the entrenched power of the military in many parts of Pakistani life. An Instagram comic recently made a video thanking the army for the pleasant June weather, while furtively avoiding eye contact with the camera as if the statement was forced.
Although the protests have died down, Internet humor maintains a political edge among Pakistanis who have learned through multiple government upheavals that serious matters of state are more digestible when they are made into a joke. But many still suspect the military will have the last laugh.
