Representation and Exploitation of War and Conflict: Publicly Appropriable Media as Low Hanging Fruit
| dc.contributor.advisor | Alilunas, Peter | |
| dc.contributor.author | McLaughlin, Andrew | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2024-01-09T22:35:42Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2024-01-09T22:35:42Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2024-01-09 | |
| dc.description.abstract | This dissertation examines the phenomenon of War Porn, a term that describes the visual destruction of bodies in conflict to elicit a visceral reaction in viewers for the purposes of titillation and entertainment. I examine the historical trajectory of the concept across mediums, genres, and platforms. I argue that War Porn has gone from niche and discrete collections to a professionalized industry, operating on mainstream social media platforms, and consequently raising new moral and ethical questions about the exploitation of the publicly appropriable archive (or PAM). I contend that War Porn has been exploited in Mondo films, shock videotapes, and shock websites because of its status as one of the low hanging fruits of the visual archive, able to be picked and put to use with little fear of legal recourse by shock entrepreneurs working across several decades, dating back to WWII. In part, this is because of much of the contents status as orphan media, or media with unclear ownership or copyright status. These forms of exploitation have been shaped and defined by a series of government regulations. I argue that a key regulation that has created the ecosystem for War Porn to thrive online is Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996, which has emboldened shock entrepreneurs to make dividends on large, user-submitted collections of War Porn. I conclude by suggesting that we look to alternative representations of the brutality of war and conflict, providing the model of Dattalion, a network of over 100 Ukrainian women collecting visual evidence of war crimes, as one possible answer. | en_US |
| dc.identifier.uri | https://hdl.handle.net/1794/29119 | |
| dc.language.iso | en_US | |
| dc.publisher | University of Oregon | |
| dc.rights | All Rights Reserved. | |
| dc.subject | conflict | en_US |
| dc.subject | Section 230 | en_US |
| dc.subject | war | en_US |
| dc.title | Representation and Exploitation of War and Conflict: Publicly Appropriable Media as Low Hanging Fruit | |
| dc.type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation | |
| thesis.degree.discipline | School of Journalism and Communication | |
| thesis.degree.grantor | University of Oregon | |
| thesis.degree.level | doctoral | |
| thesis.degree.name | Ph.D. |
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