A whimsical wisdom

While the allure of online political satire stems from its capacity to tickle the audience’s funny bones, its functions are conjectured to go beyond mere amusement, including its potential to shape political knowledge, opinion, and activism (Baum, 2002; Xenos & Becker, 2009; Gregorowicz, 2013). Besides, with a dearth of India-specific research, a deeper exploration is vital to understand its role in fostering political engagement within its democratic set-up. Hence, the study intends to measure the relationship between the consumption of online political comedy and the political engagement of the youth of India. The analysis relies on the concepts of media exposure theory and incorporates the correlational research design while adopting a quantitative approach to explore the association between the two. The data was collected from 800 youth (18-35 years) in four first-tier metropolitan cities of India (considering the high internet penetration and accumulation of youth in urban cities) and analysed using SPSS and SMART PLS. The study finds a statistically significant, positive yet weak effect of online political comedy consumption on youth political engagement, highlighting the emergence of the “infotainment paradox.”