Cyber Sutra: The Internet Is for Porn

Author(s):  
Ravi Agrawal

In the year 2012, a generation ago in digital technology, the person who generated the most internet searches in India was not a cricketer or a Bollywood star. Nor was it a politician or a religious figure. None of them were close. The person most Indians were curious about that year—as measured by the total number of Google searches—was Canadian-Indian Karenjit Kaur Vohra, a.k.a. Sunny Leone, a former porn star and Penthouse Pet of the Year. It wasn’t the case only in 2012. As hundreds of millions of Indians continued to discover the internet through 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, and even 2017, Sunny Leone remained the most-searched-for person in India. People simply couldn’t get enough. (Prime Minister Narendra Modi made it to number two in 2014, the year he was elected, but Leone remained the clear favorite.) Prudish, conservative, family-values India . . . and a porn star? Leone was no longer even performing; she had stopped around 2010 and started her own production company with her husband and manager, Daniel Weber. In 2011, she came to India as a guest on the reality TV show Bigg Boss, a local version of the Big Brother franchise. Leone’s appearance was predictably controversial (by design, of course: it was good for the ratings). Although most Indians hadn’t heard of her, it didn’t take long for word to spread: “A porn star—from America—here in India?” At the time, parliamentarian Anurag Thakur complained to the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, arguing that Leone’s presence on a nationally telecast program would “have a negative impact on the mindset of children.” Thakur added: “When children see these porn stars on TV and then do a Google search, it shows a vulgar site. It will have a bad impact in the long run.” There were no laws, however, to stop Leone from appearing on TV. While the production of pornography was officially illegal in India, Leone could justifiably argue she was no longer involved in the industry. She was trying to pivot to general entertainment.

Author(s):  
Jennifer Friedlander
Keyword(s):  

This chapter engages with the reality TV show parody The Joe Schmo Show, whose premise rests upon a cast of actors convincing an earnest participant that he is competing in a Big Brother–style reality. It compares The Joe Schmo Show with a series of made-for-TV movies based around “true events” and “real people,” with which it aired contemporaneously. It argues that, unlike docu-dramas which enable viewers to “see through” the fictionalized scene, The Joe Schmo Show functions in an unexpectedly disruptive way. Through setting up a seemingly irresistible scene for “seeing through” the ruse and then exploiting its attendant traps, the show accomplishes the subversive task of undermining the power of the ideological call of mastery associated with the realist form.


Author(s):  
Jennifer Friedlander

This chapter analyzes “Bitte liebt Österreich” (“Please Love Austria”), the controversial public art installation created by the late German conceptual artist and provocateur Christoph Schlingensief. Schlingensief staged a variation on the reality TV show Big Brother, in which asylum seekers were housed in a structure in a public square in Vienna, Austria. Passersby were invited to cast their vote each night for which detainee should be evicted the following day. By staging his intervention as a “game” that borrowed from the familiar “reality TV” genre, Schlingensief invites us to consider the question of whether using a fictional, game-like mode of representation to describe a politically reactionary event may help to subvert it. He thus offers an important twist to the logic which undergirds the position that realistic depictions of revolutionary events can themselves be politically potent.


Author(s):  
Richard A. Voeltz `

Media critics of the war in Afghanistan and Prince Harry’s participation in it hoped that his imagined kidnapping by the Taliban portrayed in the British TV mockumentary The Taking of Prince Harry (2010) would prevent his return to Afghanistan. Prince Harry’s first deployment to Afghanistan in 2007-2008 was conducted under a media blackout to protect him from potential Taliban threats. He returned home after news of his service leaked out on the internet. However, his second deployment to Afghanistan after the mockumentary aired was radically different. The British media was now given almost unlimited access to Captain Wales in terms of interviews, television coverage, and video postings on YouTube. Prince Harry’s second 20 weeks serving in Afghanistan from 2012 to 2013 became an effective reality TV show and viral internet sensation, culminating in the propaganda documentary exercise of Prince Harry: Frontline Afghanistan (2013) that the British government and military hoped would erase the public relations disaster associated with his first deployment that prompted the making of The Taking of Prince Harry. But the successful packaging of Prince Harry proved difficult in the Internet Age. In fact, the perceived unfair treatment of Harry by the media prompted such a strong reaction in him that it can be seen as instrumental in the current attempts by Harry and Meghan to establish new identities separate from the monarchy through a newly refashioned celebrity.


2009 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Zala Volcic ◽  
Mark Andrejevic

Abstract: In this article, we consider the themes and reception of To Sam Ja (That’s Me), a Big Brother–style Balkan reality TV show filmed in Macedonia in 2004 and 2005 that featured several cast members from former Yugoslav republics living together. Drawing on examples taken from the production and reception of To Sam Ja, we explore the way in which the show manages political and economic conflicts by transposing them into the realm of the personal.Résumé : Dans cet article, nous considérons la réception de To Sam Ja (C’est moi), une émission de téléréalité réalisée en Macédoine en 2004 et 2005. À la manière de Big Brother et Loft Story, To Sam Ja met en vedette plusieurs représentants d’anciennes républiques yougoslaves vivant ensemble. En nous fondant sur des exemples provenant de la production et de la réception de To Sam Ja, nous explorons la manière dont cette émission gère les conflits politiques et économiques en les transposant dans le domaine personnel.


2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 197-222
Author(s):  
Tom Lane

This article measures discrimination in the reality TV show Big Brother, a high-stakes environment. Data on contestants’ nominations are taken from 35 series of the British version of the show, covering the years 2000–2016. Race and age discrimination are found, with contestants more likely to nominate those of a different race and those different in age from themselves. However, no discrimination is identified on the basis of gender, geographical region of origin, or level of education. Racial discrimination is driven by males, but females exhibit stronger age discrimination than males. Age discrimination is driven by the younger contestants discriminating against the older. Regional differences emerge, particularly between contestants from Greater London and those from the north of England; northerners have a stronger tendency to engage in racial and age discrimination, and to discriminate in favour of the opposite gender.


2020 ◽  
pp. 283-297
Author(s):  
Amit Lavie-Dinur ◽  
Yuval Karniel
Keyword(s):  

2021 ◽  
pp. 129-142
Author(s):  
Sławomir Rybka

A liberated woman as an example of emancipation presented in the TV show "Warsaw Shore: Ekipa z Warszawy” MTV is a TV channel that has had a revolutionary impact on the development of pop culture. This station, which initially broadcast only videoclips, under the influence of the development of the Internet, especially YouTube, was forced to change its profile. Nowadays MTV is dominated by reality shows, some of which are very controversial. In Poland, “Warsaw Shore: Ekipa z Warszawy” – local version of the American “Jersey Shore” format, is very popular. That TV show presents a specific woman’s image, which has been described as a “liberated woman”. Analysing 12 seasons of that show, seven main characteristics that make up the image were identified.


2020 ◽  
Vol 66 (No. 7) ◽  
pp. 335-344
Author(s):  
Muhammad Waqas Khalid ◽  
Ashar Sultan Kayani ◽  
Jamal Mohammed Alotaibi ◽  
Muhammad Muddassir ◽  
Bader Alhafi Alotaibi ◽  
...  

Higher consumption and increased import requirements for the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) region can be catered through neighboring trade partners if resources are optimally utilized. The purpose of this research is to analyze the connection between regional trade of SAARC countries and the food security challenges faced by the region. The study uses data from 1990–2018 for Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh to econometrically analyze the determinants of the volume of food trade. The results show that the gross domestic product of importing or exporting countries and foreign direct investment (FDI) have positive impact on regional trade. The bilateral exchange rate between trading partners has a negative impact on the trade volume. The results also showed the absence of a long-run relationship between volume of trade and food security using Johansen’s cointegration test. Our analysis suggests that policy makers should focus on the means for creating favorable environment in Pakistan and India to not only meet the increasing global demands for food but also increasing their competitiveness for high-quality and low-quality priced products in major exports markets.


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