Culture
jamming is, in a sense, a subversive form of satire. It is usually used by
people who want to send a message about the dominant ideas/power in society.
Components of society, like news, are taken, and twisted to create new meaning,
to portray the ways we are being controlled by mass media.
Programs like The Colbert Report,
The Daily Show, or the Rick Mercer Report are in fact what we would call
Culture Jamming. These programs are however satirical, and may not be the greatest
place for your day to day newscast, however it gives the public a different
view on the news of what is really going on in the world. Also it makes the
news light, and funny, which is a nice change of pace for feeding us
information that might not be the greatest information to hear.
People may
argue that satirical news is not as accurate as “real” news, which would be a
fair argument. What is not a fair argument is the idea that culture jamming is
a less valid form of information distribution to the public. It is, arguably, a
“smarter” form of delivering the news, and in that audiences must interpret the
meanings. This forces the audiences to critically think about the concepts
being presented to them. In this way, culture jamming is a beneficial form of
conveying information on our society, while maintaining a light, comedic tone.
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