The asinine, acidic reactions to
the AIB roast on YouTube was predictable and on expected lines. It was rather
surprising to see the AIB boys release the apologetic video so late after the
initial act was uploaded. It would have made more sense had they inverted the
ordering of the video uploading. Given the claustrophobic rate at which people
in this country get offended, this would have been only apt and intelligent
thing to do.
To suggest and test the idea that
the sense of humor of this country is changing is a foolish thing to do. After all,
one of the biggest unorganized industries in this nation, the film industry is
based on the idea of star worship, creating larger-than-life (and often false)
imagery of certain persona, to sell the common people that image and mint money
out of it. All this creates a sense of false self-importance and ego in the
minds of certain public figures. However, it would be wrong to single out the
film industry for this egotistical rush. Even the political figures of the country
suffer from this illusion, and it is the public who are to be blamed,
hero-worshiping a fallible figure that after all is human. The gist is that
these people, at the focal point of all this adulation, begin to take
themselves too seriously, and hence are easily offended by the slightest jest directed
at them.
The role of the media must not be
underestimated here. They should be the public voice, the opinion that keeps
the people in power from developing this sense of false imagery, to show them
the reality. However, the only thing media is capable of doing these days is
create false propaganda at the behest of certain powerful entity, often at the
exchange of valuable service or preferential treatment to alter public thought
process. The recent elections in the country are a scary indication to the
changing demography of governance and politics. The landslide margins in West
Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, pan-Indian assembly elections and the most recent Delhi
legislative assembly elections point out to the worrying factors that emerge. In
all the above mentioned elections, the decimation and annihilation of the opposition
party has been so absolute that the parliament has been stripped bare of any
credible opposition. While many point out that this translates to smooth
implementation of reforms and policies, this also gives rise to dictatorial
tendencies in the ruling party, as the centralization of power is completely in
their hands and no real opposition to pull them back in case they slip up. It’s
a classic case of sheep being guarded by wolves.
