05.14.06
Why I Sympathise With Shakti Kapoor…
…and Why You Should Too
(This is from one of my older writings, but still relevant.)
Consider the following: the girl makes persistent phone calls to the actor, addresses him flirtatiously by his first name. She does not object to his sexual pass, “I’ll give you a massage if you are tired or you can give me a massage if I am tired,” and invites him late at night to her hotel room, serves him vodka with the excuse of seeking professional guidance. — The Indian Express
This raises many issues.
1. Why does it matter? Who exactly is Shakti Kapoor?
Had Shakti Kapoor been someone who had declared himself to be a hugely moral person… and the media conducted this sting operation, it would have been termed an expose.
Did Shakti Kapoor ever declare himself to be a hugely moral person? Did parents ever tell kids… there, you should be moral like Shakti Kapoor, and that they feel let down on knowing this?
No. None of us ever considered SK a paradigm of virtue. He’s just an actor. He asked someone for a sexual favor… she could have refused.
The End.
2. Why do we expect high moral standards from every public figure?
Morally everybody is on the same street. Any person could be moral. You do not need education, pedigree, or money to be more moral than another. So pretty much your postman, dabbawallah, doodhwallah are all moral people. Do you tell your kids that they should be hardworking and moral like the doodhwallah?
No… look that’s the Chief Minister, kids please fall at his feet and get his blessings. Oh… you did not know that politicians are corrupt, they take huge bribes during election campaigns, help all their business house cronies, abuse public funds? You did? So all you care is that the person can achieve success that is recognizable by society.
There… you’ve set the standard, now everyone wants to achieve that standard and doesn’t care a damn about the path they take.
Take for example, all the high society prostitutes that the police keep rounding up. There are literally millions of prostitutes in Kamathipura and Sonigachi. These are women who have been kidnapped from villages, brought over from Nepal, sold by family. They have been forced into a life of prostitution. Contrast this with the high profile prostitute who is doing this on her own free will. What’s the problem that the police and society have against the high-profile prostitute? That the educated woman selling her body is criminal, but the poor illiterate woman should be exploited? Why aren’t the police freeing these poor women and rehabilitating them? (Answer: Too much of a hassle, not newsworthy or promotion worthy.)
3. Is this an issue?
A film star, prime minister, vegetable seller, computer programmer are people doing jobs. Do you stop buying vegetables from your vegetable seller because he is having an affair with some woman other than his wife? Do you really even care?
They why are you concerned if a public personality is cheating on his wife? You would love that all public figures were really spotless people, but if I were the Prime Minister of India and want to have an affair, that’s my business, not yours. (How do you know that his wife is not being frigid or is a real shrew? Is the Prime Minister not human or fallible? His job is governance, not to set a moral example. What if you had this hugely moral PM who had no governance skills; would he be your candidate of choice? If you had to choose between two candidates, one who can do his job but is promiscuous or one who cannot do his job but is not promiscuous, who would you choose? You’re sure? What if this job is your open-heart surgery operation? Well… that sure helped make up your mind.)
If a politician/government servant takes a bribe for doing some work, he should be penalized because he is being paid for the job anyway and he could be taking a huge risk by giving a less qualified person a very responsible job. So giving an unqualified contractor something important like constructing a flyover or a dam could have serious consequences to public life if they collapse and/ or are damaged due to bad workmanship. A Tehelka-like sting makes sense because it clearly portrays that the country is at risk when defence equipment is not purchased on merit. Politicians are public servants associated with governance. They owe it to the public to do a good job governing the country and ensuring that their ministries perform smoothly. Tehelka caught them not doing their job. Where their sexual interests lie is none of our business.
4. What is news?
News is usually an aberration from the norm.
“It’s been a great day in New Delhi, no violence, no unnatural deaths, no crime…” This is not news (maybe in the times we live now, it is ). If all channels say ‘everything is fine with the world’, why would you watch the news?
Shakti Kapoor has a reputation as a film baddie, and also to some degree as a real-life womanizer. Had he been caught on tape refusing the woman’s overtures that would have been news!
What’s important for all of us is to ensure that the media focuses on important issues. A person being promiscuous is trivial compared to a communal riot, a rape or a killing. But since all three are now commonplace they don’t help sell newspapers or get better TRP ratings for channels. Major issues get ignored in our country everyday and real issues get trivialized. I read a lot of articles about rape in India and people vehemently pushing for the death penalty and castration as deterrents. Why do they not realize that even getting a rapist in prison is a big deal in society, since courts are really slow and it takes eons to come to a verdict? The problem here is with the process and not the punishment. Getting people to understand what the real issues are, in a way, is the responsibility of a responsible media.
The Intellectual Terrorist
-blows your mind
