Political Memes as a Medium for Criticism on Platform X

Authors

  • Dyah Ayu Novita INDONESIA State University of Surabaya, Surabaya
    Competing Interests

    The author declares no competing interests.

  • Navia Rehan Andien Rizkya INDONESIA University of Pembangunan Nasional Veteran Jawa Timur, Surabaya
    Competing Interests

    The author declares no competing interests.

  • Hannif Ristiana Shiva EG Al Azhar University, Cairo
    Competing Interests

    The author declares no competing interests.

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.64595/wasathiyah.v1n2.p145-158

Keywords:

Social criticism, Semiotics, X platform

Abstract

Political memes have become an increasingly common form of political communication on social media, yet previous studies have paid less attention to how memes construct criticism of government priorities in relation to socioeconomic conditions and perceived public needs. This study aims to examine how political memes on X construct such criticism through Charles Sanders Peirce’s semiotic framework. A qualitative descriptive approach was used to analyze five political memes purposively selected from publicly available posts on X between August 2025 and March 2026. The memes were selected based on their use of combined visual and textual elements to criticize government policies, political figures, or related political issues. The analysis focused on the relationship between the representamen, object, and interpretant in each meme. The findings show that political criticism is constructed through numerical comparisons, policy juxtaposition, irony, cultural references, visual incongruity, and symbolic contrasts. These signs connect government policies and priorities with issues of economic inequality, public policy benefits, environmental concerns, energy-sector power, and differences between officials and ordinary citizens. The study contributes to political communication research by showing how Peircean semiotics can explain the construction of political criticism in memes, while also demonstrating how memes connect policy debates with everyday public concerns in digital public discourse.

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Published

2026-08-29

Issue

Vol. 1 No. 2 (2026): Transforming Political Participation in Islamic Society

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Articles

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Copyright (c) 2026 Dyah Ayu Novita, Khalid Syaifullah, Navia Rehan Andien Rizkya (Author)

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

How to Cite

Political Memes as a Medium for Criticism on Platform X. (2026). Wasathiyah: Journal of Political Islam and Society, 1(2), 145-158. https://doi.org/10.64595/wasathiyah.v1n2.p145-158

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