DECODING DISSENT: A THEMATIC AND DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF FACEBOOK USERS' REACTIONS TO POLITICAL SATIRE ON PAKISTANI LEADERSHIP
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.68156/th8y6861Keywords:
Audience Engagement, Critical Discourse Analysis, Digital Polarization, Facebook, Pakistan, Political Satire, Thematic AnalysisAbstract
This study is an investigation of both linguistic and emotional reactions of Facebook users in Pakistan to satirical messages against political leadership and the role of humour as the medium of political criticism in a media landscape where formal channels of dissent are limited. Although political satire has been an integral part of the digital discourse in Pakistan, the decoding, contestation, or reinforcement of political narratives through comments and reactions of audiences is under-studied. In this study, the author utilises a qualitative research approach that includes thematic analysis and Critical Discourse Analysis to analyse seven of the most pertinent satirical posts that were selected from three Facebook pages that are popular for political satire and from the audience comments, reactions and shares generated by each of the selected satirical post. Results indicate that humor serves several and sometimes contradictory purposes here: it allows users to complain about corruption and economic disparity, offers an opportunity for disillusionment about political and civil-military institutions, and offers a non-threatening platform for dissent. The same wit often simultaneously serves as a catalyst to deepen partisan polarization, to label opposition factions disparagingly, and sometimes to lapse into abusive language of an illiberal, insulting, and gynocentric nature beyond the domain of political criticism. The study joins the emerging literature on digital communication, popular engagement and political satire in South Asia by providing an empirically supported account of how humor unites and polarizes Pakistani Facebook publics and discussing some ethical and methodological implications of engaging with openly hostile user-generated political content.
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https://web.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=2529505473882659&id=100004696938116
https://web.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=980288460797978&id=100064500000455
https://web.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=2888067208026482&set=a.412995995533628
https://web.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=2904066513093218&set=a.412995995533628
https://web.facebook.com/reel/1589311031976874
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/15tVzHNZT5/
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1625wjEZc1/
Appendix (A) : Links to Analyzed Posts
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Note: The in-text citation "Suleman & Saleem (2024)" in the original manuscript could not be independently verified and has been removed pending the author supplying full, verifiable bibliographic details (or an alternative, verifiable source making the same claim).
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The following publicly accessible post URLs correspond to Posts 1-7 analyzed in Section 5. Consistent with the ethical approach adopted in this study (Section 4.3), these links are retained for transparency and replicability; researchers reusing this dataset should independently re-verify current accessibility and platform terms of use before further analysis.
Zhao, S., Grasmuck, S., & Martin, J. (2008). Identity construction on Facebook: Digital empowerment in anchored relationships. Computers in Human Behavior, 24(5), 1816-1836.
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Copyright (c) 2026 Nasir Aziz, Shazia Mueen (Author)
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
