Culture Jamming

1. The first ever cultural jamming;

"My fellow Americans," exhorted John F. Kennedy, "haven't you ever wanted to put your foot through your television screen?"

This was however not the real Kennedy speaking, but an actor in "Media Burn'', which was a spectacle staged in 1975 by the performance art collective Ant Far. The fake Kennedy spoke of America's addiction to the plug-in drug, stating "Mass media monopolies control people by their control of information." Which then an assistant set TV sets on fire, which the crowd absolutely loved. This is the first cultural jamming which I could find, all the way back to 1975.  It is also questioning political assumptions behind commercial culture.

Source; http://www.markdery.com/archives/books/culture_jamming/

2. Most influential culture jamming;

When it comes to today's society, I would say that Borat is one of the most influential culture jamming's. Sacha Baron Cohen who plays Borat made a movie in 2006 named Borat, and it was a mockumentary comedy film about a fictitious Kazakh journalist traveling through the United States, recording real-life interactions with Americans. This was used in my list because of all the controversy surrounding the movie as it had a protagonist who is sexist, homophobic, and antisemitic. The actor who portrays Borat was featured in Times Magazine's 100 Most Influential People list, which proves my point as to why Borat (the character who made Mr Cohen famous) is so influential.

Source; http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowlny/magazines/times _100 _most_influential_includes_borat_bin_laden_obama_tyra _not _you _58320.asp
http://en.wikipedia.or/wiki/Borat:_Cultural_Learnings_of_America_for_
Make_Benefit_Glorious_Nation_of_Kazakhstan

3. The most damaging culture jamming;

The Yes Men are a culture jamming activist-duo consisting of Andy Bichlbaum and Mike Bonanno. They primarily aim to raise awareness about what they consider are problematic social issues. The Yes Men often deploy a satirical approach: they pose as a powerful entity (typically a corporate or government representative or executive) and make ridiculous and shocking comments that they believe to be an honest rendering of the organization's ideology. Furthermore, they acknowledge the idea that many corporate or government entities manipulate their ideology using spin; in response, the Yes Men use this power of spin to their own advantage, and use media outlets to disseminate their personal interpretation of the situation. A sense of humor and shock value is usually employed to make these issues more palatable to the general public and to call greater media attention to stories of interest. Some of these outrageous ideas include the possibility to sell one's vote or that the poor should consume recycled human waste. On most occasions, little to no shock or outrage is publicly evoked in response to their prank. The reason as to why I chose them as the most damaging culture jamming is because they created a lot of chaos for the companies which resulted in a lot of law suits. However, they did get their message out to the public on all the lies and social problems caused by the government and various companies.

Source; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Yes_Men