Politically Incorrect

Lookie! Here I am, again, on the last day of this year. And rather annoyingly, Facebook, it seems, won't go away. In fact, social media has become humungous. Absolute nobodies become household names overnight. Household names get cut down to size when their misdemeanours become the target of very public, and very personal flogging. Again, through social media. Careers are made or broken, because of viral responses to stuff on social networking sites. And it is being hammered into our heads, non stop, that social media is the next best thing since sliced bread. The wheel. That it really is the cat's meow.

Heh, no.

Let me explain. India, in the past few months, has been hit by a popular movement against corruption, led by someone called Anna Hazare. The rights and wrongs of his movement, I shall not go into (not in this post, anyway), but Mr Hazare, we're told, has "hundreds of thousands of millions" of supporters across India and the world. How are these numbers arrived at, do I hear you asking? Well, its based on how many people "Lick" his Facebook page or "tweet" his twatter page, or something. And its not just for this, its an epidemic. When Sachin Tendulkar had scored about 70 runs in a recent match, NDTV already had a page up to "congratulate Sachin on his 100th 100." Well, he never got there. And yet I'm sure the page got millions of licks. And twats.

And based on these numbers, people make money. Advertising revenue. It doesn't quite translate into anything in the real world, though. It is so laughably easy to "support" or "congratulate" someone, clicking on things from the comfort of one's home. Click, click, click, click - it takes no effort at all. Damn nearly no time spent, nor energy, nor money. And so, when Mr Hazare expected hazaron to rally against corruption, he got about two attendees. And quite likely neither of whom had licked his page. Does this mean, then, that people aren't bothered about corruption? No, I'm sure they are - but just bothered enough to click. And nothing more. That's how its been for quite a while now, hasn't it?

What, then, has social media changed? 

Thanatophobia -

 - I hear, is the fear of death. Yes, that fear. Of death. Arguably one of the most popular phobias. Or at least one of the more popular ones. But I wonder how many actually have the fear of death in itself, which is essentially a biological process. I might even go as far to call it a biological milestone. I'm inclined to think more people are afraid of the implications of death - not being able to do the things you've wanted to do all your life, not being able to meet the people who matter to you, not being able to achieve anything more - and so on and so forth. Which then begs the question - Conquering the fear of death, which many (for lack of a better word) Godmen and saints have claimed to do - Is is really something to be proud of?

Isn't it a statement that you're making - that nobody really matters to you anymore - that you don't have anything else to achieve? That you think the world can't find you useful in any way whatsoever? Isn't that a rather sorry state of mind to reach?

So! All the fuss of not being afraid of death! What's it about? 

Postulate

Sometimes, you can do everything right. Well, mostly right. And still not get the result you deserve. Or you think you deserve.

What, really, can you do with an examiner that disagrees point blank on a fact?

 :D

Just saying. For future reference. 

An obsession

He watched the much too dramatized sensationalized masalized news report of the plane hijack, and the terrorist's demands to the government to free their contemporary. He watched the photos of the hijackers' young families put on millions of screens worldwide. Their pretty normal wives. Pretty and normal, in fact, he thought.Their children, the same as children around the world, oblivious to the fact that their fathers at the very moment were away, inconveniencing (to put it mildly) a plane-load of people for as an elusive and abstract concept as freedom. He watched the arrested terrorist be released from jail, land in a secluded airfield and appear at the door of the plane, at the head of the stairs-on-wheels. He watched as the terrorist waved, with a face overgrown with scraggly and patchy hair, like the garden of a house whose occupants had died. And yet, a face alive with the jubilance of impending, if rather undeserved, freedom.

He felt no emotions - none for the lives of the military men who had been lost in arresting the terrorist. None for the emotions of the family of those on board the hijacked plane - all of whom must be thanking their government, and still praying hard, for the whole episode to end. None for the politicians, who wondered about the political impact their decision would have on the next election.

Instead, he found himself wondering, rather uncontrollably - if the terrorist had received a free upgrade to business class when he checked in for the flight. If he had, would his escort police officers be upgraded too?  

Just a thought

So these guys - with their mohawk-ed, mullet-ed or spike-d hair, a few hundred rings and of different sizes on their face, a plethora of shiny things dangling off of their necks, waists, jeans; their trousers worn around their knees, with a few holes in appropriate, and a few in inappropriate places, a few tattoos of various things, including characters from a language they don't understand  -

- You're telling me that one day, a man is going to look at them and say "Yes, you are what I'm looking for, I am going to give my daughter's hand in marriage to you"?

Well, what a world.