'We can sh*t for another 10 years.' Toilet paper, pandemic politics and cultural citizenship. Issue 2 (4th March 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Hermes, Joke; Kopitz, Linda
• Is Part Of: Continuum. Volume 36:Issue 2(2022)
• Page Start: 244
• Page End: 259
• Publication Date: 2022-03-04
• Subjects: Cultural citizenship -- pandemic -- humour -- memes -- covid-19; Motion pictures -- Australia -- Periodicals; Broadcasting -- Australia -- Periodicals; Mass media -- Periodicals; 306.05
• DOI: 10.1080/10304312.2021.1998373
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1030-4312

Abstract

ABSTRACT: The global reality of the COVID-19/Corona pandemic paradoxically boosted national politics, broadcasting and citizenship. Media coverage, especially initially, praised citizen solidarity and the creative solutions that were pioneered to care for each other. A year later, a lasting social learning curve throughout and after this crisis seems illusory. The pandemic, this paper argues, needs to be understood in a longer timeframe as the working through and coming to terms with neo-liberal governmentality. The (often hilarious) early responses on social media provide a strong entry to do so. Our focus will be on the Netherlands which had a so-called 'intelligent' lockdown during the first wave of COVID-19 in the spring of 2020. Using the authors' own sharing back and forth of toilet paper memes as a starting point, we aim to explore the notion of collective self-reflection and citizen co-education underlying both heated and simply ridiculous posts. Using previous discussion of cultural citizenship, this paper inquires into how pandemic citizenship played out as a vast exercise in disciplining and distinction through jokes and anger. The material suggests a nostalgic turn that might point to an implicitly voiced critique of neoliberal governmentality.