Wednesday, September 05, 2012

SG is a moron

"Violent action is just a step away from violent thought" Meaning - we want to control your thought, like thinkpol in 1984.

" What is needed is for social media stakeholders, legal experts and government to come together and create a detailed code of hate speech and the punishment each offence will carry."  - 2 years for calling some one a moron, 5 years for calling some one incompetent?

That was Sagarika Ghose in Outlook. For those who are unaware, Ghose is the CNN-IBN deputy editor. She is also proof that going to St Stephens, getting a Rhodes Scholarship and an M Phil from Oxford doesn't cure one of inherent emptiness. Ghose's gaffes can fill an entire wikipedia page. The most memorable one for me is her wishing "Good Friday greetings to all! Hope we're all getting some easter eggs today" on Twitter. She is one of the most ridiculed journalists in Twitter. And she hates twitter because they fact check and make her look stupid. That is what drives all theses journalists nuts. Years of carefully created public image blown away because some anon some where points out that you are full of gas.

But the real danger with people like Ghose is that they seem to have the ear of UPA government. One can almost see these Delhi journalists' hand in blocking twitter handles. The actions of the UPA government - banning websites, demanding apology from Washington Post for an editorial - would make one think that the Orwellian world has arrived. Only the stupidity and the clumsiness of the government make it a bearable farce. And the knowledge that the inertia of India makes it impossible for the country to swing to either extremes.

1 comment:

find me if you can said...

I kind of agree with you fully! But she has a point. A democratic country like ours should have proper legal recourse! There are so many fundamentalist websites and google croups which operate solely spewing venom on anything & everything, sometimes so trivial is considered as an offense/insult& whatever they decide is correct or wrong.
They make it look like so noble but its totally the opposite. For ex: http://www.hindujagruti.org/