Description
The issue of Palestine has historically mobilized contentious politics in the MENA, functioning as a gateway to dissent in activists’ home countries. The current genocide in Gaza may play a similar politicizing role for gen Z youth and subsequent generations, who have grown up fully connected to the Internet, and have been more immersed in global events and exposed to a steady stream of endless catastrophes and graphic images, constantly mediated and remediated. At the same time, the shift from legacy to networked media has produced a meme-ification of politics, whereby the gravity of events is leavened by humor, and tragedy sometimes trivialized in the process.
What effect does the current saturated media environment (markedly different from the Web 2.0 of the early 2000s) and the meme-ification of political conflict and war have on the politicization of youth in the region? What emotions does it mobilize, and what types of solidarity and political engagement does it facilitate and foreclose? What are the implications of this for the future of contentious politics in the MENA? This paper examines youth engagement with the ongoing genocide through social media, particularly the case of the “Hot Houthi,” a viral microcelebrity depicted as a young, attractive Yemeni pirate ostensibly involved in the Houthi rebels’ hijacking of commercial ships in the Red Sea in order to leverage a ceasefire on Gaza. Rashid el Haddad, also referred to as “Tim-Houthi Chalamet” quickly became a symbol of regional resistance of the underdog, making solidarity “sexy.” Analyzing this and similar viral moments, this paper asks, does the frivolity/play associated with such viral microcelebrities undermine the revolutionary potential of a media object and reduce serious political issues to empty spectacle? Or does it amplify it by making solidarity sexy and political engagement pleasurable?
