Friends,
A long write-up on Facebook, which some of you might agree with. Would like to have your reactions please.
Amitabh Thakur
amitabhth@yahoo.com, amitabhthakurlko@gmail.com
# 094155-34526
An Idiot on Facebook
As stated in an earlier post, it is not all that easy to write something on Facebook without the possibility of getting rebuked or severely attacked. More so when you are trying to write something which you think is a satirical piece.
I got the taste of writing satire on Facebook when after my piece on Boston police encounter, I was told to wake up and stop hallow bragging and also to limit myself to writing a few "I, me, myself" kind of puerile poems. As if this was not enough, I later cane to know of another post by a gentleman named Sujit Sarkar. Sarkar saheb is not directly connected to me as a friend on FB but we have a common friend Madhu Rayala. Mr Madhu shared by post on his wall which, it seems, was read by Mr Sarkar and it made him so infuriated that he immediately wrote-"I first thought of writing a long piece to puncture this idiot Thakur, but then I realized it would be a waste of my time." He followed it by-"There is a saying in Bengali: Akashay tara, fora! Roughly translated, it means the comparison of star in space with the imagined star in between the hind cheeks when upturned and viewed from above. 5 year olds are getting raped every other day and this scoundrel decides to write utter crap on his maiden post LOL."
Thus Mr Sarkar, who studied at the prestigious St Xavier's College in Kolkata, could immediate decipher, conclude and declare that this Thakur is an idiot and is also a scoundrel. Idiot means a person who has a less developed mind, not fully developed in nature. In a way, an imbecile or a fool. A scoundrel, on the other hand, is a crook, a rascal or a villain. Prima-facie it would seem that a person who is an idiot would not be a scoundrel at the same time, the characteristics of the two being so much opposite to each other. Yet, Mr Sarkar suo-motu concluded that I am not only an idiot but also a scoundrel, two things very difficult to happen simultaneously. What is even more remarkable is that he could grasp this fact still not comprehended by many of my close friends, so quickly only through a small piece of literature.
Mr Sarkar is not the only Facebook user who grasps things so swiftly and is able to place another person so correctly in a jiffy. Again it is not that getting condemned or abused on Facebook is limited to satirical writing. Many a times even some serious write up may land you in such a soup where people not agreeing with you or completely disagreeing with you, start denigrating you so as to hurl the choicest of expletives. There may be occasions when the disagreement of views may not be tolerated at all.
What is interesting to note is that many a times the persons making such disparaging remarks may be complete strangers to you but the way they present their views in an extremely confident manner, declaring you an idiot or a buffoon or a fool or a nincompoop or imbecile or coward or mad or anything else, is really amazing. It shows how much vista Facebook has opened for all those dormant talents that had so far remained hidden because of the lack of suitable technological methods. To express oneself has been one of the greatest human desires and innate needs and Facebook has come as a great facilitator for this.
I don't know how things are shaping up in other countries, particularly the Western nations where possibly the fear and respect for law and respect of fellow human beings is higher than what we see in India, but in India Facebook has brought a free-for-all situation where a Digvijay can be turned into a Dogvijay in a day just because he has angered a set of people through his comments as regards an individual whom these people had started reposing their faith. No one is being spared and all the public figures are facing the daily threat of getting soaked in these juiciest of words the moment a few individuals or a group do not like any of their acts, actions, words, statements, policies and what not.
Respect for law is possibly not one of our strong points and in a land where a very large number of people don't even fear stringent laws related with murder, rape, terrorism, bride burning and such other extremely serious and heinous crimes, it is quite obvious that a mild law like Defamation as defined in section 499 IPC whose penalty in section 500 IPC is simple imprisonment for a term which may extend to two years, or with fine, or with both, would hardly have the ability to instill fear in the minds of the people about thinking twice before uttering or before putting their thoughts.
Facebook has ushered us in an era of free speech where we can all state whatever we feel like and if ever law tries to catch up with any of us, all of us start yelling together that our fundamental right has been infringed. Thus "Rights without duties" being one of our powerful traits, a whole set of Facebook users are today seen abusing, denigrating, maligning, defaming, pouring acidic scorn on other people, feeling quite safe that the Fundamental Right to freedom of expression, together with the poor implementation of law, will come as a great saviour to us.
Till the time there was no Facebook, anyone who wants to condemn others (public figures, authorities or anyone else), had to come out of our houses, gather a group of people and then shout slogans so that they may be heard by "whom it may concern." There was the added fear of ending on wrong side of. Now the same thing can be done through the click of a mouse, without much pain or efforts and in one go we are able to inflate any person's prestige and position.
Many of us are using this power with the new found vigour and eagerness and the result is a public platform where many a times we see everything except a sense of responsibility.
It may hurt a few of such free-for-all users, the great votaries of the freedom of speech, but the fact remains that denigrating a person out of the bloom, without any rational or without any substance, many a times based on sheer presumption or personal preferences or ideological differences, is certainly not good for any responsible society because any society that cheers and lauds irresponsibility is bound to have loose respect for law and this is naturally going to further worsen the societal order.
When I say all this, never for once do I want to say that there shall be throttling of mouth or silencing of voice. All I want to say is that each one of us, who luckily got this power of expression through Facebook, shall realize that this power needs to be used with a great sense of responsibility. The concept of self-restrain and self-regulation seems to be the need of the hour while using Facebook. We shall also understand that respect for dignity of other human beings is a sin-qua-non for every civilized society and any word spoken or written shall always be with a great sense of responsibility.
Otherwise, the phrase "power without responsibility" may soon turn into Damocles' sword hanging on each person's neck where every other FB user would be seen using words like idiot or scoundrel for others just because he does like the person's face, his nose, his hair style, his political party, his caste, his creed, his ideology, his statements, his write ups or any other thing in this world.
Amitabh
__._,_.___
| Reply via web post | Reply to sender | Reply to group | Start a New Topic | Messages in this topic (1) |
MARKETPLACE
.
__,_._,___
No comments:
Post a Comment