Raging Against the Meme: Hegemony, Protest Music, and Memes as Ideological Capital

The purpose of this thesis is to analyze how the music and rhetoric of Rage Against the Machine is co-opted and delegitimized through internet memes. After a thorough internet search, I chose five memes that express opposing viewpoints to that of RATM’s anti-capitalist, liberalistic messaging and examined their appropriation of lyrics from their popular hit “Killing In the Name.” as well as the accusations of hypocrisy levied against the band for being inauthentic protest musicians. I also draw comparisons between the structure of these five memes and other politically centric internet memes such as Pepe the Frog and his appropriation by the alt-right, and the attacks against the hashtag Black Lives Matter through the antagonistic hashtag All Lives Matter. I observed the way internet memes use cultural icons to distort and shape narratives about the images’ meanings, in certain cases dissolving an icon’s original message or context entirely. I also propose the idea of internet memes as “ideological capital” that internet users exchange to bolster hegemonic thought and a national identity.