Andrea Langlois et al - Islands of Resistance - Pirate Radio in Canada

Pirate Radio and Maneuver • 157
mitting in the name of art represent a lesser wrongdoing than an unlicensed
radio transmission with strictly political intentions because of
the “impunity of art,” 28 which makes the wrongdoing a cathartic and
liberating act of maneuver? Or, do radio pirates simply make a limited
impact that does not worry State-run institutions controlling public
spaces, leading these institutions to tolerate such intruders rather than
vigourously prosecute them?
The answers presumably lie in the delicate balance between the possible
responses to each of these questions. Pirate radio falls within a
landscape peppered with a plethora of commercial broadcasts that
dominate the airwaves with their strong signals and large areas of
transmission. Pirate radio only somewhat disturbs the balance already
attained by radio stations. In this proliferation of symbols, of signifying,
pirate radio leaves tiny traces. The sterilization of the airwaves is
not — for now, in any case — put at risk by this form of resistance
because of the concentration of media in the hands of a limited number
of conglomerates. 29 This kind of media monopoly is characterized
by problematic situations, such as the restrictions placed on the types
of news stories chosen by those at the helm of public radio stations, 30
the increasingly hard-to-find free spaces on radio stations filled with
formatted-radio content, and the repetition of news stories of major
media outlets on community radio stations. In such a context, radio
pirates and artists operating with unlicensed transmissions, whatever
their format continue to raise the stakes in an exemplary manner by
providing models of radio use that are radically different from those
promulgated by dominant institutions. The relationship between
established, licensed radio stations and pirate radio broadcasts creates
a fertile breeding ground for challenging the economic reign over
public spaces and the airwaves.
This phenomenon also questions the impact of neo-liberalism and
the players in radio whose values are reflected in their standard programming
throughout the mediascape. By extension, this dynamic
reminds us that practices commonly accepted in society can be questioned
and challenged, and that perspectives have to be multiplied
in order for socio-cultural contexts to evolve. In this sense, the radio
maneuvers discussed in this chapter serve to highlight these issues
and effectively expose the unnecessarily functional format that makes
up today’s radioscape.