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Saturday, April 19, 2014

Media- the cancer.

Media- the cancer.
I would like to get into the cancers afflicting the media without getting into the specifics but expose the cancers.

Let me make it very clear at the outset that I do not have any affinity for any political outfit nor am I representing any big non- governmental corporate house.

The malady is multi pronged not only confined to paid media and media bias due to their political and corporate nexus etc which are all very well known and much talked about by everyone, including those media houses who do not have the luxury of being in  such wealthy company of corrupt politicians and corporate  giants who fund them.

There is another sweeping generalization which goes like this, ‘when the whole society is corrupt, valueless, oral less and unethical in all its dealing why should media alone be expected to subjected to scrutiny involving such standards not in tune with the general trend of ethics less society and valueless life styles’.

But then,  it is purely because the media dons the role of an universal judge, sometimes arrogates itself to sit on judgment on everything and everyone; proceeds to act as self appointed umpires to decide on matters of social concern, national security, sensitive issues etc without the least concern about the repercussions acting without an iota of responsibility; delves into unsolicited catchy labeling /sloganeering devoid of truth and facts just to pander  to some ideological cages within which it is caught thinking  such ideological identification keeps them on a high pedestal of great social elites who are concerned about the welfare of  either human race, environment, actual victims or media created victims etc.

Most importantly in doing all these it [the media intentionally and with an unpardonable sic herdish instinct] swings like a pendulum between selective amnesia and collective indifference, like for example reporting ‘members belonging to a particular community’ [ Is it out of diplomacy, fear , pressure  or money or all these?];it is reliably [reliable according to whom?] learnt from sources [ what sources or which source?]; inclusive growth [what is meant by it? Any growth measure when taken up has to be inclusive, unless it is Viagra] secular [to mean anything against Hindus as no media house has the courage to report the plight of Kashmiri pundits [it is on par with what has been done to Kurdish people by Saddam Hussein, i.e. people living in a particular place for generations together have been made into refugees in their own country by their own countrymen and media is in stoic silence for the past so many years. Minority [means or at least refers either covertly or overtly only to Muslims whereas those real minorities less than 10% of the population religion wise Buddhists, Jains, Christians, Sikhs, Parsies etc are conveniently forgotten, media is a major culprit in all these, in fact more than the political or ideological outfits that prefer or prescribe to these labels]; what about Anglo-Indians and poor Brahmins? They both neither get any benefit in terms of caste as well as religious status. Why is the media more keen on 17th century classification and use them as tools to divide or create a fear psychosis leading to imagined or imaginary defensive aggression; in some cases the media is the cause of such violence. Why does not the media admonish all or any form of violence/terror attacks by any outfit be it Maoist, ISI etc against or on innocent and unprotected citizens who go to malls to shop during Dewali or people who check in at star hotels. Why the media grabs only certain clashes and highlights them while blissfully ignore the plight of victims be it the pandits driven out of their homes, the Tamils driven out  from Srilanka, the tribal children forced to take to arms by the Naxals, or women being burnt alive and consigning that along with their dead bodies as mere accident. This can happen to media persons too; it did happen in Tamil Nadu some people working in a particular media house were burnt alive and no other media across the country even bothered to highlight it.
The outfits in whose favor the media is playing the game of propaganda and brainwashing  opinion molding techniques may /can/ will turn their violence against the very media if things are not going in their favor, how their ire manifests may vary from  a mere verbal tirade to  killing of journalists. Nothing can be ruled out when the media has sold its integrity and honesty totally for some consideration.
I cannot resist referring to a small example here. While the media created AAP and its now popular, sorry notorious, AK49 whose past credentials are at best a mystery, myth, at worst dubious and in reality cunning manipulation of ANNA HAZARE movement to opportunistically hoist himself, the very same media rarely reports the simplicity and the good work that a more sincere and sane IITian has been doing sincerely as a CM of Goa. He does not require any media certificates to get elected next time as was the case with MODI, in whose case the entire media was doing only the post mortem of Godra riots without even once mentioning, leave alone   highlighting the truth as to what triggered the riots.

Media persons, you all please mature and realize the fact that the present generation is interested in availability of water, electricity, internet, better returns for their agricultural yield, more factories and industries, improved infrastructure, unadulterated food, better educational facilities, more job opportunities, peaceful social life, overall economic development etc and not debating and discussing the relative merits or demerits any political, religious, economic ideologies or identities. These could be favorite past times for some TV anchors who never get time to see real life outside their air-conditioned chambers.

I think all political parties, especially the two major parties BJP and Congress must realize that they need to do away with all their old vote bank politics and make a paradigm shift in tune with the times, that is perhaps why MODI’s proven track record in economic development is making him loom larger than the party not his looks, not his family background, not his caste, not his religion, not any of his pet ideological projection etc.

It is this lack of governance that has shown the door to B.S. Yeddiyurappa or Gehlot.

Even an iota of expose of the suppressed facts, biased reporting etc by the media will pulverize the giant false pillars of the media.


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