Journal 17 - Truth is a Virus

            Andrew’s presentation was interesting to listen to as he described different literary works related to Asian Americans and I enjoyed his book recommendations, including The Sympathizer. I included that book on my “to-read list” and look forward to its contents. I thought he brought up a good point about trauma porn and who can write about trauma, like the Vietnam War or the Khmer Rouge. I never thought about it until he mentioned it, but it does seem true that many Asian Americans want to forget about the terrible memories instead of remembering them, memorializing those who died in the struggle, and vowing to never repeat. Unlike Jewish people, Asian Americans run away from these historic events and it makes me wonder who can convey these traumatic events so that they are not forgotten.

In Andrew Boyd’s “Truth is a Virus,” he discusses how memes influence political culture and can serve as a form of cultural resistance. These organizations that create the memes share the same ideas and help spread their opinions through social media platforms. Memes are popular on social media and immediately grab the viewer’s interest because of their wit and humor. This reminded me of Omar’s presentation on comedians of color, because they share the same wit and humor to convey a message of resistance. Like comedians, these memes are also subversively refuting the status quo and poking fun at current leaders (Trump’s criticism on media) or trends. Not only is social media an extremely powerful platform for people to gather, but it also an excellent place to spread ideas in a flash and start a movement. These ideas were also reflected in Roy’s article on mobile culture in Bombay.

In Ricardo Dominguez’s “Electronic Disturbance,” he talks about how electronics play a key part in political and economic movements. Electronic activism can instigate change, which is an idea that has been mentioned in both Roy’s and Boyd’s articles. Although technology did not use to be the mainstream platform for activism, its efficacy is growing now that future generations are using more technology and social media. Ideas do spread like a virus on this platform, since they catch on so quickly and are liked, retweeted, posted, or forwarded to more people.