Page 56 - Battleground The Media Volume 1 and 2

Aud ence Power to Res st |

a greater level of media savvy overall. Precisely because so many individuals fear
media effects, therefore, warnings of the media surround us, encouraging us to
be wary in general, but also offering specific strategies for reading against the
grain in particular. Some of these warnings are offered by the media themselves,
as good parody and satire. Some in particular operate as media literacy primers
on media genres, as does The Daily Show with Jon Stewart with the news, or The
Simpsons with the family sitcom.
Also, as consumers, we are capable of enjoying a media message without
wholly agreeing with it. Some television programs, for instance, have intriguing
characters, are filmed in attractive and artistic ways, and/or examine places of
considerable interest. But we can like one part of a program and dislike another,
loving the “look” of a show, say, but dismissing its politics, or loving one charac-
ter yet despising another. All of us no doubt have had the experience of falling in
love with a song whose lyrics elude us, an experience that illustrates how easily
media messages can be parsed and divided. Even fans, then—those consumers
who seem most obviously passive—are often active, thoughtful, and/or discrim-
inating readers, viewers, and listeners.

an ExamPLE: CuLTuraL imPEriaLism
A particular example of the debate over media consumption and audience
power can be found with regards to the suggestion that American media are a
“cultural imperialist,” Americanizing the planet and socializing the youth of the
world to yearn for all things American. American media have a foreign pres-
ence like no other national media, their music, films, and television dominating
many foreign markets. But some argue that non-Americans are free to resist
the messages of American ideology embedded in so many of these global media
messages, and that to argue otherwise is to belittle the intelligence of foreign

teleVision without Pity (www.televisionwithoutpity.com)

Considerable evidence of active audience behavior can be found at the Web site Televi-
sion Without Pity. The site offers hundreds of discussion boards on new and old television
series, and postings from site moderators and from the site’s thousands of posters frequently
approach the programs from a satiric, critical angle. Thus, amidst the many professions of
idolatry of other shows, one finds Are You Hot? described as having “telegraphed more like
a slave auction than something sexy and fun to watch” and Just Legal is said to have been
“a wreck from the first fifteen seconds of the pilot, and it only got worse from there.” Even
posters who follow a program closely, clearly enjoying it, prove ready, willing, and able to
share frustrations with gender or race depictions, overt and gaudy consumerism, and with its
politics, or simply to mock unrealistic events and characterization, or transparent attempts
by a show’s writers to create emotion and pathos. Television Without Pity serves as a running
dialogue between viewers and television, one that illustrates the many complex interactions
between consumer and media.