Viral irony: using irony to spread the questioning of questionable consumption

There is iron in irony (Ewart, G. 1980. Selected Poems 1933–1988. New Directions Books: New York, NY).Acentral concern of public affairs is the notion of social justice and the scrutinizing of truth claims in public discourse where the power of social actors is asymmetrical. The mechanisms of rejection of truth claims tend to fall into two camps: direct and indirect. The direct method is simply a public rebuff, whereas the indirect method is to employ a rhetorical device such as irony so that citizens question the claim for themselves and, as importantly, pass the message onto others. It is on this latter mechanism that this paper focuses using the case study of the coal industry's truth claim of ‘clean coal’. Our paper is set out as follows. First, we explore how irony can been used to question the ‘green’ or environmentally friendly claims of powerful organizations. Second, we review the theory of ironic communication and use it to deconstruct the video ‘Coal McClean’. Third, we explore how irony can help a subversive message spread through social networks, or to go ‘viral,’ in ways a direct message cannot. We conclude with a reflection on the research opportunities that the notion of viral irony provides in public affairs. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.