I think it gained momentum with Twitter, if not started,
which provided a platform for common people to connect with celebrities. Generally,
celebrities have oodles of fans who are devotedly self employed at applauding,
admiring, congratulating and singing songs of glory for their icons. So adding
another song to it wouldn’t have paid a penny hence few decided to try their
hands on talking objectionable about them. Using degenerating language for celebrities
and demeaning them in the face not only made those few noticeable but also pleased
their ego like the cat that’s got the cream. This began to trend.
Soon, controversial remarks and unprincipled stunts began to
evolve as a rapid route to publicity and few opportunists like Poonam Pandey,
cashed it remarkably. The trend further levelled up and a group of people
deduced that our country is now ready to host a contentious show like AIB where
celebrities are subjected under humiliation and embarrassment; a concept that
is widely popular in western countries.
What they do in the Indian version of the show, AIB, is
cross the already drawn socially acceptable lines of cracking jokes to crack
jokes. Their argument in support is “Thousands of criminals and rapists are
roaming free and you are outraging over a joke cracked by us comedians” but
sorry to say that “Thousands of criminals and rapists are roaming free” was
supposed to be a worry, not an excuse. That it’s not illegal what you do is
grantable but can the law institute such set of rules to which you can comply
with while cracking jokes? No, because jokes thrive on your sentiments,
experiences, personality and many such idiosyncratic events and profiting on
Government’s helplessness to technically frame a set of guidelines for it,
makes you a person who flourishes on democracy’s loopholes suggesting, you technically
didn’t break it but contravened the intent of the law.
That is where social norms come into effect. Social norms
can make rules where the law technically fails. Although most of their rules are
arguable and can be discarded without having much of consequences to face but
certainly not this because in a subsequent time if a guy smacks a joke on your
face about your mother diminishing her to an ill-repute, all in good humour,
you can’t do a trifle because he is well within the boundaries of law and if at
all you’ll react in a fashion similar to how you are expected of, that will be
illegal. So what we can do from here is keep advocating their sense of humour
in the name of freedom of expression or think of drawing a line.
Free from any preconceived notion about him and his show and
conserving all my even-handedness, last night I watched the Tanmay Bhat’s
controversial video of Sachin Tendulkar and Lata Mangeshkar’s roast and found it
to be very shoddy and extremely unintelligent. The least a viewer expects of
your jokes is to be funny and sadly that wasn’t. Not only it was ill-scripted
and disgracefully presented, it was also not comic which safely proposes that
the video was just a tawdry stunt for seeking attention.
Few people campaigned for Tanmay Bhat asking why is he being
targeted when there are thousands of twitter handles doing the same. Well, to
them I would say, thousands of people are raping girls which don’t give me a
license to rape one. Moreover, Tanmay Bhat is a public figure whom people take
as a pattern making him socially more responsible and careful. Also it’s needless
to say that the message is for all.
I am not antagonistic towards all of Tanmay’s work. In fact,
I subscribed to few of them. I even didn’t lodge much protest to what they did
at Worli on December’14 because the roasted artists had their consent for the
show. But assembling mindless jokes on the foundations of vulgarity gives you
an undeserved regards and uncalled messages which need to be confronted one of
these days if not today.
The whole indignation can be summarised as, someone made a
joke about somebody which few people didn’t like and hence are requesting him
to stop. As simple as that! If at all it is requisite to use derogatory words,
use it to make your point, don’t make a point to use it needlessly. The lesson for
Tanmay to learn is that comedy is, cracking a joke without cracking a soul. Moreover
with a built like his’, he don’t need to do third-rate tricks, he’ll
effortlessly stand out in the crowd (all in good humour).
