LuminousVoid

Via Boing Boing I learn that the Saint Mary’s College of California is teaching a course in culture jamming. Among other things, students tried to plant a fake news story in the media. None succeeded.

Beldner said he wanted to teach students how to bring issues to the public eye using creative methods. His course syllabus defines “culture jamming” as “a resistance movement to the perceived hegemony of popular culture.”

Some people are concerned though. Should we be teachings students to lie, to undermine journalism, and essentially make the job of publishing the truth harder?

But journalists already have their hands full sifting facts from fiction without having to worry about deliberate misinformation, said Austin Long-Scott, who teaches journalism ethics at San Francisco State University. He compared the hoax to a computer virus.

“He is teaching students to try to screw up an important system that has enough trouble getting things right,” Long-Scott said. “It’s a destructive thing to do, and it violates a general societal ethic.”

Maybe those students should stick to taking Public Relations and Corporate Communications courses. I wonder what the folks at the Center for Media and Democracy, publishers of PR Watch, think. Their about page gives us a hint:

PR Watch specializes in blowing the lid off today’s multi-billion dollar propaganda-for-hire industry, naming names and revealing how public relations wizards concoct and spin the news, organize phony ‘grassroots’ front groups, spy on citizens, and conspire with lobbyists and politicians to thwart democracy