While the world is facing the most severe epidemic in decades, the Arab peoples are shielding themselves with a state of ridicule and making jokes about the new Corona virus, in light of the modest circumstances in which their governments are confronting the epidemic, and exposing their already exhausted economies to a state of complete recession, with most of these countries imposing curfews for fear of the spread of infection. But the question that imposes itself here is: Why do the Arab peoples resort to this method in the face of a deadly epidemic? What were the experiences of some people in mocking and joking about the epidemic and the current difficult circumstances that their countries are going through? If it was an attempt to dispel fears of him, could it succeed?
A weapon that unites us
Simply put, we, as Arab people, are unable to stop the infection spreading among us, and we are forced to bear this reality while we are helpless and isolated in our homes. Therefore, we find that humor is now our most effective protective shield, and therefore, with laughter, we can regain some control and communication, because laughter is essentially a social sound that binds people together. In our Arab world, which has been living for nearly 100 years in a state of instability, due to colonialism, a succession of wars, endless political and economic crises, and the absence of democracy, as the American magazine The Atlantic says, many Arab people believe that the most difficult days have passed for them, and that this virus that has begun to terrify the world is merely “one of the many causes of death” in our Arab world.
“Laugh in the face of the virus”
Social networking sites in the Arab world received a huge influx of jokes about the Corona virus. Many saw it as one of the ways to confront the disease, and that people gathered on it to fight the epidemic and regain the human connection that they were forced to lose due to home quarantine. While others warned against going too far with waves of sarcasm and jokes, because they may hurt the feelings of those affected, and that we must also be careful not to turn humor against the weak, the sick, or minorities who may be accused of causing the crisis. In this report, we monitor for you some examples from Arab countries that dealt sarcastically with the spread of the Corona virus:
Egypt.. “shattering” the virus
In Egypt, a country whose people always deal with crises with a lot of sarcasm and humor, activists have launched several sarcastic hashtags that deal with the successive news with some black comedy, criticizing what they described as the government’s blackout, the official handling of the crisis, and the silencing of journalists who criticize the official numbers. Tweeters considered that the widespread ridicule and skepticism of government data about the limited spread of the virus in Egypt at first; This is what prompted many countries to classify Egypt as a hotspot and a source of infections, even though Egypt has not yet announced any infections. Which led to a ban on entry of Egyptians into many countries. Tweeters also commented sarcastically on the Egyptian government’s decision to provide medical aid to other countries such as Italy, while the Egyptian people are in dire need of these tools, considering that many hospitals in Egypt are places that are not suitable for treatment in the first place, and that there is a severe shortage of infection detection equipment in the country, and that the numbers would be many times greater than what was announced if tests were conducted more widely. The Egyptians early made a torrent of jokes about the actions of the Minister of Health, Hala Zayed, when the minister went to the hospital designated for health isolation wearing the mask in the wrong way, and although she confirmed that the matter was just an experiment, this did not help her, and she was subjected to a torrent of sarcastic tweets and drawings. They also tweeted mockery of the minister’s dispatch to China, in an act that was not done by an official in any country. Fearing the spread of the virus. Meanwhile, social media activists decried a demonstration that took place in Alexandria against the Corona virus, criticizing the gathering in the street at a time when everyone is calling for the need to stay at home to combat the spread of the virus, as they considered this gathering a hotbed of infection and transmission of the virus.
Algeria…desert jokes
Reactions to the state of panic that accompanied Algerian society, following the outbreak of the Corona epidemic in the country, varied, some of which were funny and sarcastic, and others were strange. Despite the state of panic that struck society, following the rise in cases of infection with the virus, some found it an opportunity to find a sense of humor and wit. Among the funny snapshots circulated by activists was a picture of a man wearing an onion mask instead of a medical mask. Some customs also changed during the days of home quarantine, and pictures spread of men cooking instead of their wives, accompanied by a sarcastic comment: “Peel the coward is better than going to the coward,” meaning: “Peel the peas instead of going to the cemetery.” In an expression of protest against raising the prices of medical protective materials, such as masks and gloves, Algerian activists circulated a video of a young man walking around the capital, Algiers, wearing a green, large-sized plastic bag, instead of wearing the known protective tools (gloves and masks). While activists reacted to the situation that their country had reached during the days of Corona with a kind of sarcasm and sarcasm, some refused to deal with that, and criticism was also directed at a private channel, recently, whose journalists impersonated doctors, and took to the streets of the city of Oran (west of the country), to film a hidden camera program about Corona, in preparation for its broadcast in the month of Ramadan. The program owners deliberately examined passers-by and claimed that they were infected with Corona, which caused anger and resentment among Algerians.
Lebanon.. “Corona Authority”
Lebanon is suffering from very difficult and perhaps catastrophic economic conditions, and the Corona epidemic has come to make matters worse for the Lebanese people, as the Lebanese government announced in early March that it had defaulted on debt payments for the first time in the country’s history, which is considered almost a declaration of bankruptcy. In addition to all of this, the country lacks infrastructure, and the health sector suffers from accumulated problems and a shortage of supplies, devices, and equipment. In the midst of all this, the Lebanese faced the arrival of the virus in their country with a state of black comedy, as some saw this as “the end of the world” and “the beginning of the apocalypse” for them, while others considered that the Corona virus was undesirable in Lebanon, because the country was already suffering from the “Corona of Authority.” The interaction with the virus was also affected by the political movement that Lebanon had been witnessing for several months before the Corona virus reached it, criticizing also the prominent presence of Iran in the Lebanese political scene even in light of Corona. In the country where the first infection was transmitted via a person coming from Iran, before a succession of cases occurred, some social media users focused on this point and also treated it with sarcasm. Someone wrote on Facebook, commenting: “Even you, Corona? The whole world came to Corona from China, but we came from Iran!” In the end, the state of humor and sarcasm in dealing with this epidemic in the Arab world may indicate to us that the joke still brings together our peoples and brings them together from different sources, origins, beliefs and dialects, so that the collective joke forms a weapon in the face of fear and panic of the disease, and to confirm to us that we are all similar in pain and distress, and facing the scourge and epidemic that did not differentiate between anyone, and spread throughout the country from the farthest to the lowest.
