Week4 HOW MEMES COMMUNICATE HUMOR
Overview
United Airlines Passenger Removal refers to the controversial ejection of a passenger from a United Airlines flight, after the airline informed the plane that they would be randomly selecting ticket-holders to give up their seats.Background
On April 9th, 2017, a video of police forcing a United Airlines passenger off of flight 3411 went viral on Facebook and Twitter. After boarding the plane at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport, the airline announced that they had overbooked the flight and requested four ticket-holders give up their seats for four United employees. When no one volunteered, United randomly selected four passengers for removal. One of those passengers, David Dao, a doctor on his way to Kentucky, refused to give up his seat. Police forced him out of his seat and dragged him off the plane.Twitter user @JayseDavid, a passenger on the flight, posted a video of the removal to Twitter. In the post, he writes, "@United overbook #flight3411 and decided to force random passengers off the plane. Here's how they did it." The tweet received more than 29,000 retweets and 18,000 likes.
The incident thus drew outrage on mainland Chinese and Vietnamese social media, and became the number one trending topic on the Chinese micro-blogging site Weibo, attracting the attention of more than 480 million users. The incident also outraged Yelp users and low star rating were given to United Airlines in Chicago and other cities including San Francisco. An article in Foreign Policy noted the racial and political reasons for the widespread of the video throughout the mainland Chinese mediasphere, where there are heated debates over the nature of America's political system and its relations to China, and asserted that the video would serve the ends of the authorities and critics of America in challenging America's cultural sway in China. Ire in Vietnam grew after it was reported Dao's origins in that country. There was also negative reaction to allegations over Dao's past being reported in the United States, which was viewed as irrelevant and possibly racist. Dao's reported account of feeling racially profiled incited outrage elsewhere in Asia. This incident ultimately involved the issue of racial discrimination.
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Here are the three related memes I have chosen. Shenfield (2013) explains that there are different forms of humor: playfulness, incongruity, and superiority. With each different types of humor come different interpretations and reactions to the memes being shared. I will analyze the humor factors in these memes in detail.
The first meme I choose is a meme that produced humor through Incongruity. The UFC logo is marked in this meme. When people see this logo, they usually think of two men with muscles fighting. But in the picture is a United Airline flight attendant and an Asian man, and wrote: "United VS Random Asia guy." And at the bottom of the picture, there is a line of "Tickets on sale but seats not guaranteed". This sentence further satirizes the fact that the passenger bought the plane ticket but was dragged off the plane because there was no seat. As Shenfield (2013) said that "According to the incongruity theory of humor, comedy derives from an unexpected cognitive encounter between two incongruent elements, as in a pun" (Shenfield, 2013, p. 79). In this meme, the two sides played an inconsistent humor with the UFC image, and further satirized the United Airline beat other race passengers on the plane, comparing it to fighting on the plane. And the pun on the date of the ticket and the text of the seat further satirize the incident and bring a humorous effect.
The prototype of this meme is the scene of the famous movie "Get out". A black man leaked a very frightened expression with tears in his eyes as if he saw something very terrible. In this incident, this expression is intended to express: “When united airlines call your name on a plane.” This meme uses exaggerated way to express the reaction of people of other races hearing their name on the plane. As if calling your name, you will be beaten. This meme shows its humor in an exaggerated way. It showed its playfulness, and people can use this black man with horror expression to participate in this activity and express their views on this matter. In adiition, this meme uses a black people, and the side expresses the reaction of other low-level races in the old concept. As Shenfield (2013) said: "but also take pleasure in scornfully imitating them, thus publicly demonstrating their own superiority" (p. 81) People will use this sense of superiority to express a sense of humor.
The prototype of this meme is called Roll Safe. Roll Safe is an image macro serious featuring a screenshot of actor Kayode Ewumi grinning and pointing to his temple while portraying the character Reece Simpson (aka "Roll Safe") in the web series Hood Documentary. The images are often captioned with various jokes mocking poor Decision making and failures in critical thinking. Just like "you can't get cheated on if you don't get into a relationship" and "You can't be broke if you don't check your bank account." It is welcomed with funny expressions and inconsistent logic.
The meme I chose was created by fans after this event, with the words "You don't have to worry about overbooking if you don't have any clients." People satirize this with funny words and funny logic. Shenfield (2013) explains that: “Like game-playing, humor is enjoyed for its own sake and involving a multilayered perception of social situations”(Shenfield, 2013, p. 79). This meme also represents playfulness, as these types of memes allow users to own The way to "create" and encourage more people to participate in this "game." At the same time, the image of a black man is used here, which also metaphorizes the issue of race. This is also the reason why this meme produces humor and is involved in the spread of people.
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These three memes have been widely spread because of its humorous attributes. In addition, these three memes are related to the issue of race which is the core issue of this incident. People use humorous memes to express the irony of racial discrimination on the United Airlines. People criticize the wrong behavior of the United Airlines through the spirit of playfulness, incongruity, and superiority. I think that in the context of current technological development, memes have become a new way of expressing dissatisfaction. People express their irony and dissatisfaction with the current events by creating and spreading humorous memes.
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