Technology and democracy: Where politics and pop culture collide
"In an age where film stars become presidents and politicians appear in television sitcoms, politics and popular culture have become inextricably linked," Temple University Press says in the introduction to the book "Politics and Popular Culture." Author John Street argues that "we must understand that each is a form of the other."
The crossover between politics and pop culture
The book's opening chapter cites the example of John Hinckley's 1981 attempt to assassinate then-President Ronald Reagan, inspired by his infatuation with film star Jodie Foster, as "an example of the intimacy in which politics and popular culture coexist."
The MIT Communications Forum, also discussing politics and popular culture, says that "Robert Putnam has suggested that the political consciousness and civic engagement of the post-World War II generation may have taken shape in bowling alleys and other spaces where community members gathered." It goes on to ask a series of questions, including, "Are we seeing a blurring of the roles of citizen and consumer?" It also posits whether this fusion of news and entertainment is a positive or negative development.
Academic institutions aren't the only ones asking these questions. From the entertainment side of the equation, MSN's Today Celebrities carried a piece in 2008 discussing presidential candidate John McCain's use of pop culture figures Paris Hilton and Britney Spears in his ad campaign. The article included the comment, "All this back and forth between a socialite most famous for a jail term and a sex video and the man who might be president could seem, to some, a dangerous blurring of the lines between pop culture and politics." That was followed by the observation that "those who study such things say these lines have long been blurred."
The examples of this blurring, from Dwight Eisenhower's Walt Disney animation to Richard Nixon's Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In appearance to Bill Clinton's appearance on The Arsenio Hall Show playing the saxophone all involved more traditional media.
The influence of technology on democracy
As the University of Phoenix College of Information Systems and Technology notes, though, in its promotion of technology degrees, "the future and technology go hand in hand. Technology has changed the way the world does business, the way people receive an education and even the way people communicate. And technology will continue to force us to innovate and grow."
Craigslist founder Craig Newmark, in an undirected iReport® recorded at a kiosk at the Personal Democracy Forum in New York in June 2008, argued that, thanks to advances in technology, "ordinary people ... are now influencing and changing the political process, both in the way we elect people and, in the future, the way we do actual governance." He added that in his opinion, "this is as big a change as what we had in 1776."
Ravi Singh, founder of ElectionMall.com, agreed that the "tools and technology" available to policymakers were changing the face of politics. "Everyday voters have now the ability to participate in politics in a way that our founding fathers could only imagine," he said.
Jascha Franklin-Hodge of Blue State Digital, in a video interview with Joshua-Michéle Ross about "how technology is affecting politics and democracy in the U.S.," argued that the power of the online tools his company provides and its ability to handle the logistics of campaigns "get people motivated, excited and engaged online and offline, using the Internet as the central hub." He said that campaign management tools are "issue- and action-centric." In contrast, he argued, social networks "are great, but in many ways tend to be somewhat navel gazing," with little motivation to move people in the offline world.
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