It has been quite a while since I stopped to talk about the English news channels in India. It's simply too vexing, and at times, depressing. I mostly try to avoid reading or watching the stupid things they put out. But sometimes, somethings catch your attention. This is when you wonder if they are even trying to hide their supposedly hidden agendas. Phrases like, "I'm sorry to interrupt you, but we have to take a break at this point, we'll be back soon" have betrayed where their loyalties lie -- to the sponsors and the shareholders, and simply, to profit. Soon they'll be saying, "I'm sure you have something important to say, but we need to sell it midway and make our millions, so hold your thoughts."
Anyway, today I ran into this blogpost written by an NDTV reporter. The post and the comments (which I believe were heavily 'moderated') just lend more credence to the disillusionment one has with the idea of India:
If ever there was a ripe case for a well-planned and executed military operation, here it was in Sri Lanka. President Mahinda Rajapakse and his team went about prosecuting what, by all accounts, was a legitimate war. (emphasis mine)
PS. I watch BBC for about 3 hours everyday. I have for the last 6 years. The only time pressure they have come under is with regard to their scheduled programming.
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15 comments:
ndtv:bbc :: uk film industry:bollywood
the first makes money, the other runs on taxpayers' sweat.
Well, that's the point.
It reminds me of what an environmental activist said on a BBC program: "It's like going to the moon, we have to want to protect our environment."
We have to think of having a relatively 'neutral' media as any necessity: like water, electricity or road.
This whole "tax payer's sweat" is a very tricky/complex subject. Statehood, property ownership, profit making, human rights, constitution etc., are all interconnected for the functioning of specific systems and completely disconnected from others.
I was born in India. I hate the country. (And I'm sure many "Indians" and India -- if there is an "India" -- hate me as well.) But I sang their national anthem for 14 years; wrote and cleared their board exams; got their driver's license; went through their bureaucracy to get my passport; paid my taxes for whatever and other things you can think of. I am, for legal purposes, still Indian.
I sometimes feel like I was molested by the country. But I wonder how I could have avoided any of that. I can't think of a different country that would have made a big difference. I wonder where my 'rights' started and where it ended. There is no wilderness left in this world. Every bit of land and water is occupied, claimed and controlled. I cannot live like the 'biological animal' if I wanted. Not in India, not anywhere. So paying for the BBC or Doordarshan is not the first time I'm 'exploited' or oppressed.
A person must be able to chose the country of his citizenship, without being bound to the one he's born into naturally. I guess its impractical... but worth trying.
I don't think lot of people will 'hate' you for saying that you hate India... Some of them do as well, and most simply don't care, because they are trying to get out of it anyway :)
The strong dictating to the weak was direct some centuries back, and the strong have gotten smarter with terms like democracy, libertarianism, to implement the same agenda.
If you really worry about all this, then when are you at peace with yourself?
That's the good thing about being a 'wobbly nihilist'. When stuff like this overwhelms you, you just say "fuck it, it's all meaningless" and sleep tight. You wake up and deal with issues of that morning (like checking the weather or being mad at the subway train).
But seriously, I don't worry about them per se, I just wanted to put the "tax payer's sweat" in context. Talking about how messed up things are doesn't make you restless after a point. It just puts things in a better, balanced position (to achieve least dissonance).
அந்த post-ல comment விடலயா? ஆர்வமா கீழையும் மேலயும் scroll பண்ணது தான் மிச்சம்.
If there is no 'short break', then they cannot survive in the first place. They should also make some money to keep them in air. Nothing comes for free, you already know that.
All of a sudden you seem to be worrying about tax payer's sweat?!! May be now you've become a working guy?!
No. I don't think you got any of what I said. Never mind.
Your comments to that post were moderated away? Or did you not comment there at all? Would've been rather interesting to read your -hopefully- elaborate reply there.
First of all, the post you linked to was poorly written. It even calls Srilanka an 'underdeveloped country' and as you pointed out, bills the lankan military strike as 'legitimate war'. Wonder if the writer was acknowledging that 'eelam' was a separate nation by calling it a war, in which case every country in the world has the right to pressurize Srilanka to stop.
However, if rajapakse really brings tamils into the fold (atleast most of them) all of this will be forgotten and the well to do tamils will start tormenting the agitating ones. I think so....
NDTV - what a fart? They are also making heavy losses.
Sudhir,
No, I didn't leave any comment. I did think of it, but then after going through what was already there, I changed my mind.
I am glad that this rowdy terrorist organization called LTTE has been completely crushed and wiped out. It was a joy to see the dead terrorist Prabhakaran being paraded on Indian channels. The Indian media did a good job in covering the war without mentioning much about the civilian causalities because this serves as a good warning of how separatism ( the so called mythical Tamil homeland) simply cannot exist and must not exist. It is only through the Indian media can we get perverted ideas like these removed from Indian minds.
The Indian media must do more in defending Sri Lanka and help rubbish all these so called "investigations" that Western Nations are asking for. Yeah, a few thousand died, but lets not make a big deal out of this. Anything is worth it to crush this retarded idea of "Tamil Eelam".
A proud Indian ( PI )
PI,
you are aptly named.
Hahahaha...
PI,
if you do not know anything at all about this issue, why bother to leave this infuriating and seemingly baseless comment?
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