The Global Flow of Visual Culture

Since long, people have been talking about the hegemonizing of the “third world” by western media. That it makes the people of the third world assimilate the values of the west and offer themselves as readily available consumers for the transnational or corporate business. This is largely true. But at the same time, the western media also offers, especially in case of the societies where media is often owned by the state, perspectives alternative and sometimes counter to that of official state media. At the same time, media like BBC have produced programs specially produced for the different countries. And in those media we can find the voices and perspectives of the local people being represented to appropriate the culture and ideology of the dominant western (or in can be that of the dominant regional power, like India) media on the one hand and the monolithic discourse of the state. So, there is no one way flow of the culture from the center (west) to the margin. Internet, like the rise of private media channels, makes media more democratic.
As the writers have said, internet offers two (multi) way conversation and dialog. World Wide Web can provide space for the articulation of the voices of almost all the people. The state and the corporate world does not have the monopoly to disseminate information and hegemonize culture. In this regard, I remember a terrible event of my country few years back. All the members of the royal family were brutally massacred in the royal palace itself but none of the media were disseminating information. Only the rumor could be heard. It was internet through which we got the news. The information reached us (living 4/5 miles away from the palace) from the western media through internet. After that we could read and hear different versions of that gruesome event. Though the state brought an official report of the massacre, I believe, most of the people could not trust that. So, the rise of internet and different other forms of media have helped in avoiding the monopoly of any single form of media. Even the rebels or “terrorists” can have their own website and bring their voices to the public.
But again what we should not forget is that there are still millions of people who have not seen computer and who are totally ignorant about internet. So, the issue of whether the internet is democratic or not is quite controversial. I remember a communist leader talking about liberal democratic competition and dialog. There can be a competition and dialog between those with similar or equal access to the resources (of any kind). But how can there be a fair competition between a lion and a rabbit (exceptions are there like in a story about a lion and a rabbit in which rabbit wittily kills the lion). That is why, internet is also a powerful weapon but only to those who have resources. The ones who do not have may speak but often not to be heard (Spivak, “Can the Subaltern Speak?”).
So, there are always two sides of every story and the rise of internet and different other forms of media and visual culture are not exception. However, internet, due to its interactive and open space, may democratize culture more than many other forms we have used and seen in our history. But at the same time it can be an illusion masked by the pervasive ideology about technology of our time which the future generation will see. I believe that though every form of media is owned and run by the powerful institutions/people/society, there are always the possibilities of resistance and appropriation.