Nepal, June 9 -- A terrifying crisis has emerged in today's political communication: Shitposting as a shield for authoritarianism. The country's chief executives and powerful leaders post bizarre content on social media that possesses neither diplomatic value nor policy-related seriousness. Yet, the irony is that these very posts are showered with thousands of 'likes', leaving their supporters ecstatic. To understand this political behaviour in the digital age, we must first understand the various dimensions of internet culture and its internal architecture.

The bizarre digital content we consume daily on 'asocial' media-as CK Lal terms it-may be broadly classified into three genres: memes, trolls and shitposts.

Not every joke or bizarr...