the panopticon: Cebu Prison, Philippines and the role of YouTube in society

readers,

have you seen the prison dance tapes from Cebu Prison in the Philippines? they're quickly becoming huge hits on the web, and for good reason. they're amazing! seriously, i haven't seen musical theatre this good since i saw Les Miz on Broadway!

to be sure, just check out these meticulous recreations of Michael Jackson's "Thriller" and "I Will Follow Him" from Sister Act:





now i'm not sure if this is considered cruel and unusual punishment in the Philippines, but it makes damn good watching on Youtube. which makes me wonder: is the Filipino prison taking the panopticon to new extremes?

consider the function of the panopticon, and these observations regarding these bemusing videos:
-the costumes (a balding, pony-tailed, made-up male inmate, wearing a halter top with falsies portraying MJ's steady girlfriend as she is mobbed by zombies)

-the music (are they singing? is there a band? is the music being piped thru the prison loudspeakers? or is the music dubbed over the original soundtrack? if the latter, what are the prisoners dancing to in real-time? a Filipino version of "Thriller"/"I will follow Him"?)

-the choreography (the spot on renditions make me think they had someone teaching them. how does one teach 1000+ prisoners intricate dance moves from the 80s with success? and that someone must have sat and analyzed the music video for weeks to figure out the whole routine. that's quite a commitment to the spirit of dance.)

-the filming (who's holding the camera? and what makes them suspect the performance they caught on tape is merely a practice round, as they say, and not the real thing? is it a guard? a tourist? are they ushering tourists thru the prison grounds and charging them admittance fees? and doesn't this bring Titicut Follies to mind?)

AND, when one searches for the "Cebu Provincial Detention and Rehabilitation Center," the reputed site of these performances, one can find nothing written about the actual Center itself, its prisoners, or its practices, other than the recent buzz on the blogs about - that's right - the very dances that brought you to search for the Prison in the first place. isn't there something a little bemusing, a little existentially tautological about that?

finally, consider all this in relation to the medium:
-we're watching these videos on YouTube, a site that has grown into somewhat of a phenomenon, injecting the daily monotony of the average person to the same level of consciousness as ground-breaking news and celebrity sightings. you can find as many videos of average people ranting about Britney Spears as you can find actual video of Britney Spears.

-Youtube, unlike network news, is always on and always available. = someone is always watching.

considering this in light of these prison videos is incredibly revelatory of the current role Youtube might be playing in our society: the media, always influencing us in the most surreptitious ways, when placed in our own hands, has the ability to make us repeat itself to our own detriment.

take a look at any Youtube video and you will see what i mean. genres are making and perpetuating themselves everyday. the vlog rant. the celebrity satire. the video journal. there's a degree of comfort in seeing "average" people "just like us" on Youtube, while at the same time, comments like "shut up you f*in whore, you ugly faced b*tch" proliferate on every Youtube channel.

while a sense of democracy and control is bolstered by the success of Youtube, we can't help but feel the media's ability to enforce certain standards of appearance and form and style is not altogether eliminated in the process.

thus the panopticon. always watched = always controlled.

-stefan!e