What is antimemetics?

Antimemetics

Antimemetics is the study and practice of ideas, designs or behaviours that resist replication in the way ordinary “memes” spread through culture. While memetics looks at how information propagates, antimemetics asks how some information can be made hard to copy, remember or weaponise. In other words, an antimeme is “a meme engineered to avoid reproduction” [1].

Origins and Intellectual Context

Richard Dawkins coined the word “meme” in 1976 to describe cultural units that spread by imitation, much like genes spread biologically [3]. The term “antimeme” arose later in several overlapping communities:

• Internet culture and digital-wellness writing (e.g., Nadia Asparouhova) use it to talk about design patterns that make ideas less addictive and less able to hijack our attention [1].

• The SCP Foundation, a collaborative fiction project, popularised a fictional Antimemetics Division that deals with information hazards remembered by no-one. Although fictional, it supplied vocabulary (e.g., “cognitohazard”, “amnestic”) that leaks into real-world discussion [2].

Key Characteristics

1. Low transmissibility

  Antimemes are crafted so that copying, forwarding or summarising them is difficult or unrewarding [1].

1. Context-dependence

  They make heavy use of personal or ephemeral context, so they lose meaning outside the original setting (e.g., inside jokes, local slang, self-deleting messages) [1].

1. Forgettability or deliberate decay

  Mechanisms such as auto-deletion, paywalls, or limited-audience release cause the information to disappear before it can spread widely [1].

1. Resistance to commodification

  Because they are hard to quote or screenshot, antimemes are less likely to be aggregated, monetised or turned into “content” [1].

Examples in Practice

• Ephemeral stories on Snapchat or Instagram that vanish after 24 hours.
• Voice-only chat rooms whose conversations are not recorded.
• Highly personal newsletters or group chats that are meaningful only to insiders.
• One-off, site-specific art performances that prohibit filming or photography.

These practices embody antimemetic design because the underlying content cannot be easily extracted and turned into viral media [1].

Public Discourse and Diverging Uses

There is no competing academic school of “antimemetics,” but two distinct communities emphasise different aspects:

• Digital-wellness writers (e.g., Asparouhova) treat antimemetics as a practical tool for attention management and “information hygiene,” encouraging users to curate environments that do not constantly demand shares and retweets [1].

• SCP fiction enthusiasts treat antimemetics as a narrative device: an idea so hazardous or reality-bending that people literally cannot remember it [2].

While fictional, this discourse influences language in tech and policy circles when they discuss “information hazards” or “cognitive security” — sometimes blurring lines between metaphor and reality.

The two views do not contradict each other so much as operate on different planes: one metaphorical/psychological, the other fictional/speculative.

Why It Matters

In an attention economy where virality is often the default, antimemetic thinking offers a counter-strategy: build or choose channels where information spreads only when recipients truly value it, not because algorithms reward engagement. Proponents argue this can protect privacy, reduce outrage-driven discourse and improve individual focus [1].

Sources

1. Nadia Asparouhova, “We Are Our Attention,” Cluny Journal. https://www.clunyjournal.com/p/we-are-our-attention-nadia-asparouhova
2. SCP Foundation, “Antimemetics Division Hub.” https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/antimemetics-division-hub (fictional source; popularised terminology)
3. Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene, 2nd ed., 1989 (orig. 1976) – Chapter 11 “Memes: the new replicators.”

Suggested Sources

https://www.clunyjournal.com/p/we-are-our-attention-nadia-asparouhova