Saturday, October 04, 2008

Al Zajira, CNN and Terrorism

I feel so proud these days as an Indian. We have not yet sent a man to moon and we have had to lean on our Russian friends to send a person to the orbit, but we have come of age so far as terrorism is concerned. Gone are the days when people manning the PMO [Prime Minister's Office] could sit back smugly and declare the hand of our friends across the border was at work in a case of terrorist attack. We now have our home grown, home bred geniuses doing it for us.... Delhi, Ahmedabad, Surat, Bangalore, BAD or worse, are our making. These are our boys not some organised Soldier and Gentlemen across the border.... . We have finally arrived in an area we have been lagging since the 1980s when some of our sikh brothers decided there is more to be made in business than in terrorism and renewed the efforts to migrate to cooler climes.
I do not want to delve into the causes behind terrorism and the factors that will bring them down. There are people who are paid to do this [yes they get paid at the level of an union secretary even after retirement and some of their grandchildren have just become jobless post the failure of i-banks in the US so they need the money much more than we do]
The point is about the media...... Isn't terrorsim more a handiwork of CNN, Al Zajira, NDTV, IndiaTV and all other media? No? Ok.
Media would say that most people "like" terrorism on TV as much as they like seeing mothers of children who have died in 30 feet ditches, or fathers whose sons have been arrested by police as terrorists, or boys whose brothers have been killed because some rich business man or rich peasant did not want to lose honour.
Even if we want it that way, is it the business of the media to show what we want? Aren't there are some dos and donts, principles, ethics, operating principles? No?
Then let me say on behalf of a depraved nation, we want to see porn everyday especially those involving nicely done up white women and those revealing private lives of our leader, and especially those telling us whose child studies where and whose wife sleeps with whom.
We as audience are dying to know these things. Please give us a break from the gory details of people dying of terrorist attacks and please let us have some fun on TV by showing on "popular demand" the private lives of politicians and journalists. We would send your TRP shooting through the roof just give us a chance.