Culture Jamming and Media

Culture Jamming is a type of an activist movement and is mostly used for a resistance or for a cause. It is
based on the ideas that go by the name of Guerilla Communication. Some of the major culture jamming
includes ad-busting, graffiti and cybersquatting. It is the process of using the modes of media
communication against itself to disrupt the continuous mass intake that people unconsciously take in.
It is a form of act that is completely different from vandalism where defacement or basic destruction is the
primary goal. It is also different from artistic appropriation, which is solely done for the sake of art.
Although different acts, but the end results of these activities are hard to differentiate and often have
somewhat the same result.
Recently, there has been a debate on the legitimacy and effectiveness of culture jamming and some argue
that it is easily commoditized by the market. This process defuses the very potential of consumer
resistance. Other debates include that culture jamming strategy of rhetorical sabotage is easily handled by
clever advertising agencies and therefore is not a very big threat to anyone because its potential is
nullified.
One of the most famous of all cultural jamming activities is the (in)famous meme. A meme is widely
recognizable and the masses accept it. Viewers are presented with an alternative way of looking at the
meme and are forced to think about the repercussions presented by the jammer. Now, because memes are
used worldwide as a symbol of mass entertainment online, there is a wide audience that is available to the
jammer, and anything or everything can be presented if willed.
Another form is using a meta-meme. A meta-meme is a message that has two levels and one o them is
submerged by the second one. It punctures a specific commercial image and on a parallel line, challenges
a larger aspect of political culture. The face value of the meme is such that the base value covers it
completely and is thus VERY effective. One of the biggest examples of meta-memes is the truth
campaigns that were carried out worldwide and were frequented of the television in the past years. They
were meant to expose the lies that the major Tobacco companies were telling the people so as to sell teir
products.
Some of the past mass event and innovations that have littered across our media modes include virtual sit-
ins and the protests over the internet, producing subvertisements. There were then placed in public
places to be viewed and therefore reclaiming public spaces and where nature is reinstalled into the
public places.
Whether it be television o radio, culture jammers find their way to society and force them to open their
eyes to the what the companies and corporate giants feed people every day. I believe it is important to
have such a dose every once in a while so that individuality and a constant thought process remains a part
of the human being, the latter being most important.