Radio: Sponsored By Industry

Due purely for a need for new advertising and advocation media, the mass good industries of the 1920's pushed to create the popularization of radio.

In an innovate medium, companies will often see potential to create a much larger base of customers. The companies invest money in programing and sponsorships for the rising medium. The funding leads to better productions riddled with advertisments for the company who paid for the show. As the medium rises, the consumer base grows, feeds the sponsor more money, which in turn invests more money back into the show.

An example is the radio mega-company, RCA. RCA's main business was selling radios, pure and simple. So in order to facilitate the need for more radios, they created a broadcasting network, NBC, to increase the popularity of their product. The popularity of the show lead to the popularity of the radio itself, fulfilling RCA's intentions.

Social Learning

Social learning, while a sometimes applicable concept, does not always apply to every individual.

The truth is that social learning is merely the result of predisposed consumers being fed what they subconsciously crave the most. A person who has a strong reaction to something he ingests through the media was already going to have the same reaction to the most dominant thing in his domain. Likewise, a person who is not predisposed mentally to being strongly swayed by TV won't run out and kill someone as soon as he sees Die Hard. People take what they want from the media.

One of the most striking examples was Charles Manson and his "family." He built a cult following and ordered the killing of numerous people because of what he believed to be a message of revolt and uprising in the Beatles song "Helter Skelter." Yet, this group was the only that did so. There were no other vicious murders or uprisings due to this song. The man was psychologically predisposed to find a guiding voice of massacre in whatever media he could get his hands on.

The message does not make you. You take the message, twist it, and eventually spit it back out to support whatever you are already thinking, if you even are paying attention.

Hegemony

Hegemony, though an influential driving force of message delivery for many media sources, can be used in opposition to said sources, instigating a form of thought reform and investigation.

This concept is usually thought of as the way to plant an invasive idea into the mind of viewers and sway their opinions. True, this is the case most of the time, but often the same tactic can be used to point out the purely ridiculous nature of the editorialists' advances. The ploy of a party with a message to force can be halted by those who refuse to sedentarily obey. Satire levels the soap box until it is nothing more than a pile of debris with no logic to its form.

In this clip, Glenn Beck is seen using obvious methods of hegemony: framing, skewing, and more. Jon Stewart comments on the again clearly ridiculous nature of the Fox News personality by imitating the Glenn Beck show on his own program The Daily Show. Through a heavy use of parody and sarcasm, the show's creator uses the same method to influence people to think for themselves and not be swayed simply by slight of hand. Though Stewart does often have an agenda, as everyone does, the focus of his segment is not on the message, but its absurd delivery and obvious construing. The apparently "righteous" major news corporation is morally challenged by the show that often follows puppets making crank calls.

Hegemony is not a one way street. Telling someone to listen is equally as hegemonic as telling them not to.