A systematic deconstruction of the power of individual action
This isn’t a love song to caress your senses, nor a poem to please your eyes.
In July 2014, I decided to delete my Facebook profile and vanish from the face of social media to cut the online ‘noise’ and restore mental & spiritual balance. The exercise has been considerably difficult. Social Media is the most dangerous addiction of our times for reasons I will write about later.
What started as a ‘cleansing’ exercise, then turned into a social experiment…
I don’t know if you’ve noticed but lately, people seem to really (like, REALLY) take to social media to express concern over the many ridiculous faces of our State and society.
Stuff like…
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*drum roll*
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The infamous
trendspotters.tv
beef ban in Maharashtra
BBC’s Nirbhaya Documentary
(Banning which took a legendary piss out of the country all over again, after December 2012)
The film Fifty Shades of Grey Glorified Abuse
That sanskaari moment when the government inadvertently prevented the release of a majorly messed up film because too much yon-sambandh
The debate on #NetNeutrality
savetheinternet.in
And the piece-de-resistance… banning of the words “Ghanta”, “Haramipana”, “lesbian”, and “Haramkhor” in a Bollywood film.
This stuff is serious for it jeopardizes the freedom of speech and expression, the right to life and livelihood, and generally paints a rather medieval picture of the state of affairs in India.
But here’s something interesting…
While these issues seemed outrageous and important at the time, they were “hot-topics” only during months March-April 2015.
Rewind to August 2014.
Remember the ALS Ice-Bucket challenge? It was an amazing campaign to generate awareness about a rare disease. Surprisingly, during the 7 days I was online in August, on my feed I saw ~25 challenge videos and about 1 article explaining what in the name of Jehovah ALS really was.
In the 9 month period between August 2014 – April 2015, the hot-topics ranged from the Ebola outbreak in Africa, the Gaza conflict, the Malaysian Airlines, Charlie Hebdo, the Peshawar Attack, to the AIB roast, and the ‘My Choice’ video among others.
This basically means:
Every fortnight or month I logged on to Facebook, I saw my friends, and friends of friends, and friends of friends of friends outraging about something new, with the same passionate fervour as they had the month before, and the one before that. Like a flavour-of-the-month.
A moving call for action to end the Gaza conflict was reduced to a hashtag (#PrayForGaza). It was something one would “like” or “share” on their way to work.
Or discuss at the pub over a beer with classmates. Or not. You were more likely to talk about something lighter like the beef-ban or the AIB Roast ban in a relaxed setting.
On Social Media we outraged. Maybe signed a petition delivered to our inbox by le Jhatkaa, or change.org
But only about 0-5 of my 700+ Facebook friends followed up with any story after its shelf-life expired. If they did, it wouldn’t show up on one too many feeds because it was no longer ‘trending’.
Okay! That’s a lot of information……
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Breathe.
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Okay.
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Here we go.
The experiment brought out some interesting patterns…
On posts about issues like the Gaza conflict, the Peshawar Massacre, and the Charlie Hebdo killings – the comments exhibited:
– A strong sense of empathy: people seemed to be ‘united’ in pain and deeply stirred by the graphic imagery churned out by AFP, Reuters, and the like
– Anger: people were enraged about the mindless killing of innocents on religious extremist, ethnic grounds
– Helplessness: So much said and done, the fact remained that any further action was beyond our control. These incidents were an outcome of some very disturbed State and non-State actors’ whims, outside our nation’s borders.
On the banning of India’s Daughter, cuss words in films, beef in Maharashtra, Fifty Shades of Bullsh*t, and the AIB roast – the emotions were:
–Ridicule: people were flabbergasted and bemused at the same time . Did the government really think banning was the solution? Were the bans necessary at all?
–Shock: Was THIS the government they had so enthusiastically voted to power?
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(Hint: YES. This is what right-wing governments look like.)
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–Anger: outrage at this ostrich-like approach. It seemed as though the government was beyond all accountability. And it was.
–Helplessness: Here we were. Angry and shocked, but still helpless. We couldn’t do much except expressing our disagreement over social media or perhaps signing a petition (which may/may not have succeeded. Did it even reach the intended authority? We don’t know)
But it doesn’t end here.
We don’t live in an ideal world.
People in Yemen are getting bombed by a Saudi-led coalition (with some very questionable intentions) as we speak.
In Manipur, the mighty Irom Sharmila Chanu continues her 15 year hunger strike in protest against the draconian AFSPA, while a nasogastric tube is forced through her nose to keep her alive in prison.
A girl or woman in some part of the world is getting murdered or raped as you read this…
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Let that sink in for a minute.
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In short:
it’s just another day in the 21st century.
Who do we think is responsible for this unabashed, spineless nonsense happening at this very moment in different parts of India and the world?
Should Gaza really concern us when so many of us harbour an immense, irrational hatred for the Muslim community, overtly and covertly?
Does the irony not hit us like lightning when we march, candles in hand, in memory of Nirbhaya; while feeling strangely powerful in using words like “maadarch*d” and “bhench*d”; and “raped” to describe some very trivial matters in everyday life?
Does it really bother us that millions of African natives died (before, and after it trended on social media) for lack of medicine and healthcare?
Did it not shake us out of a slumber when we saw the world outrage against European cartoonists killed for objectionable content, while around the same time, the African terrorist outfit al-Shabaab massacred 150 people in Kenya and not many outraged because it wasn’t relevant enough?
Its important, one too many times, to pause and think:
“Am I responsible?”
This is why I write today – to tell you that I am responsible, You are responsible. And that we all are responsible.
We aren’t all helpless.
We’d like to believe we have nothing to do with the mass poverty and crime rates in India,
but when we employ domestic helps (minors, very often) and pay them a less-than-fair-wage or give them less-than-fair working conditions – we are a part of the problem.
On the outset, it might seem that some extremist whack-jobs caused, say, Godhra 2002, or Mumbai 26/11; but it was, in part, us.
We allowed our religion to be appropriated for us because studying our own religion never interested us enough.
When a right-winger incited the uneducated multitude to kill in the name of ‘Ram’ or ‘Allah’ (even ‘Buddha’!), we were more likely to say “this is why I’m an atheist”* or “ban religion” instead of saying “ban misinformation”.
Because calling out misinformation entailed informing ourselves, first.
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And even after protesting against religion, we rejoiced in Ganpati celebrations.
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We told our girls and women to dress “right”, not seek help from, or be friendly with strangers, to be “careful”; while simultaneously slapping #NotAllMen all over our social media existence.
We jumped with joy when Ishaan in ‘Taare Zameen Par’ and Laila in ‘Margarita With A Straw’ found those moments of immense happiness – when their inabilities became so small and their lust for life transcended what ours could ever be;
while simultaneously calling people “retarded” because…..well…. it’s supposed to be a powerful ‘insult’.
In this whirlwind of television and films
and what to wear
and how to look
and showing your Facebook friends how you feel
and realizing that you are indeed, very out of touch with how you feel,
#prayforGaza and #MH370 became mere hashtags, tools for social validation.
This doesn’t mean we aren’t concerned about the world.
But are we really helpless?
Maybe, in a macro sense, for we cannot affect short-term political decisions.
So why do we not dig deeper?
Perhaps because our empathy is a limited sentiment.
When it comes to action, we are as apathetic (and in ways described above – as guilty) as those in power.
Our pain and condolences are not much different from that of a politician.
She/he feels a moment of sorrow, turns it into a photo-op for the news media;
We feel a moment of sorrow and turn it into a hashtag on Facebook.
The only difference is scale, and visibility.
As a friend reminded me recently,
“everybody loves a good villain”.
This villain is the terrorist, the misogynist, the misandrist, the classist, the racist, the rapist, the capitalist, the Naxalite, the ableist, the preacher, the homophobe, and the politician. But this villain is never us.
It takes a special kind of irony to claim one’s love for animals and nature, and have a dead animal for dinner;
to complain about alarming levels of pollution while driving around the city;
to fight the damaging gender roles for women, while simultaneously telling men to “man up”.
We say the Indian society is hypocritical.
Hells yes it is…
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… for we make it.
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The point of this post is not to take us on a guilt trip.
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(ok, maybe a little)
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But to remind ourselves that this helplessness… isn’t real.
Every little thing that we do, counts…
Gandhi wasn’t up to mere lip-service when he said “Be the change you want to see in the world”.
He meant it, quite literally.
Take that one step of courage among your friends when someone is being politically incorrect – call out their bullshit.
Shut people up when they directly or indirectly engage in oppression in any way or form.
Pick up and read a good newspaper – see the recurring patterns.
Don’t laugh at sexist cracks on men, women, and other genders.
Try to make healthier life choices by ‘switching off’ (from technology) and ‘tuning in’ (to Your voice).
Meditate. Or ‘sit in silence’, if you’d like.
Laugh with people, not at them.
Respect humans, animals, and the natural environment not because you can extract something from them, but because they are fellow living beings entitled to basic dignity, as much as you are.
Take that one moment of courage and be unafraid to sound “too sensitive”, “too boring”, and a “killjoy”,
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for in that one moment of courage you instantaneously separate yourself from all the bullshit that’s been going on for millennia, and the bullshit that goes on as we speak.
Evolutionarily speaking: You are the most advanced in that room.
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Destroy your Ego and break the cycle.
Separate yourself from the artificial system, and recognize your role as an integral part of a natural system.
The natural order of things is the state of absolute harmony and justice for all living beings.
Identify the hierarchical structures of an artificial system, and call them out.
We are ruled by the hedonistic, the divisive, and the majorly-screwed-up because they are from among us; they know what makes us tick.
By changing ourselves and the values we uphold, we directly affect our politico-legal and social landscape.
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If we decide,
this moment on,
to change our lifestyles for good…
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we’ve made a start.
Every breath you take
Every move you make
Every bond you break
Every step you take
Every single day
Every word you say…
Miscellany 