In Response to Salman and BB's Outright Injustice - Page 4

you just said what millions of people wanted to say

thank you soo much 👍🏼

@ Oyster

Much like you, I started watching the show with a scholarly interest. Your easy allusions to Post-colonial theory and critical pedagogy is indeed an interesting entry point to this debate. But I guess , along with class, community and social capital, an introspective critical pedagogy also teaches us to think about the intersection points of class and gender. I, whole heartedly agree with your points regarding Salman Khan's and Big Boss's blatant partiality towards Arman Kohli. His anti woman, anti LGBT comments were not only pathetic but I was also speechless to see how easily stereotypes about a single', divorcee' woman or an effeminate' man , fed into his words, abuses and gestures. But simultaneously, I also feel that Kushal Tandon's blatant verbal abuses regarding a woman's body type, her height or her physical features were dirty to the core. And, no I am not only talking about the task' but I have seen him repeatedly commenting and hooting on Tanisha mukherjee's physical aspects. In sum, both Kushal Tandon ( whose father is an U.P politician by the way) and Arman Kohli, both were playing the archetypal role of an abusive, protective North Indian possessive men pretty aptly. Keeping in mind , Kushal Tandon's previous comments on VJ Andy and Vivek Mishras sexuality and Arman Kohli's lurid behaviour towards Elli Avram , for me they are habitual offenders. Now, let us all come to the woman of the house. For me Bigg Boss became a snap shot of the Indian society, when strong women like Gauhar Khan or Tanisha started supporting their utter M.C.P Lover's' and their trash. They not only supported it but also perpetuated the sheer patriarchal dominance. Ie. Tanisha playing the role of the spoilt, classy' star daughter, Gauhar, the role of a caring' girl friend and Shilpa Shaklani, the role of a possessive wife. AS IF WOMAN HAS NO EXISTENCE , NO POSITION apart from being Hyphenated entities like Tan-man and Gaushal. I am not even talking about Kamya and Pratyusha here. What triggered sleazyman's reaction ? Nothing but male protectionism and a benign tolerance for his flop replica arman Kohli'.

Our largely feudal society has never let women define what love or friendship means, or should mean for women . The maximum that she can aspire for is still within the definitions that Indian society have set for them. Bigg boss is a popular show and I guess you cannot expect any critical insight from a show like this which thrives on popular biases. Here in the forum, people are talking about Kushal's undying love for Gauhar. Ohh Yes, What was this diehard love our hero Kushal stood for? Follow her around Jahannum; stare at her, hold her jacket, pretend to submit and If she does not want to be with you, pursue and tire her into acceptance or worse blackmail' her into submission. Both Tanisha and Gauhar for me was emblematic of Indian society, where an infinitely higher number of selfreliant , financially independent women are manipulated by men into violent attachments or relationships based on blackmail', than the other way around. For some, ( think of the Arman-tanisha situation), life holds no meaning without a protective man's embrace.

Ps: I was also shocked to see the way forum is divided into Tanisha and Gauhar fans , each party demonizing the other . Oh yess, I guess demonic women make it easier to get a clap and whistle from an audience full of men. Hence , I SUPPORT TANISHA AND GAUHAR, BOTH . For me, they were mere manifestations and victims of the society at large. Atleast Gauhar tries to resist it . Tanisha, in spite of being a strong woman ( considering her calm reactions to the cheap comments made by Pratyusha) plays the demure , coy and dependant spoilt woman. Regarding verbal abuse and Bitching, why single out Arman or Kushal alone, every member from Kushal to andy to pratyusha to Tanisha ,even Gauhar( Asif azim faced worst bullying by Gauhar, Kushal ,andy and sangram by the way) are all simultaneously victims and perpetrators .

Pss: Why portray Bigg brother as a holier than thou show. In west Race is a major issue and Bigg Brother and American Sitcoms are notorious for their gender or race based Jokes'.

Psss. @ OYSTER you write very well.

Originally posted by: Oyster

A small intro. I have not followed any season of Big Boss except this one. I won't say that I followed it religiously but I watched all the episodes as much as I could. You can say I have watched more episodes than I missed. I have also scanned through the topics on this forum to learn about viewers' views but I never made a post.

I couldn't help but make this post today because I actually cried while watching today's episode. I had pent up anger since the episode began and I just couldn't hold myself back when Gauhar Khan broke down in the confession room. I quickly rushed to the bathroom so that my younger sister doesn't see me because I felt I was being utterly silly. How and why would I cry watching a reality show or for some actor celebrities I have not even known?! This was beyond me. But when I thought about it closely. That was not the reason. I didn't cry because Gauhar was emotionally tortured or because Kushal was evicted. I cried because there was so much injustice going on while I watched helplessly. I cannot take injustice whether it's in the form of terrorist attacks, drone attacks of the U.S. government, domestic violence, political oppression, or class hierarchy. I end up crying every time I read or hear about someone's suffering because I quickly imagine myself in that helpless situation.

I think I was even more affected because I am currently part of a research project on Critical Pedagogy which strongly criticizes the reproduction of social inequalities in educational institutions even though they claim to be egalitarian. Preoccupied with all of these concepts and theories, here I watch a show which clearly reinforces the social inequality on national TV.

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Returning to the show. Like any other ordinary viewer, my first question was why would BB regard Tanisha's physical reaction as justified while Kushal's reaction was taken as an absolute act of physical violence. The circumstances were exactly the same. Kushal insulted Tanisha and she reacted. Andy insulted Gauhar and Pratushya which ended up with Kushal reacting. The difference is while Tanisha actually pushed Kushal. Kushal was prevented from hurting Andy by Appurva, Gauhar, and Kamya. But the judgments passed in both cases were surprisingly contrasting. There's obviously no way of justifying the partiality. This is probably why they didn't even broadcast BB's response when Gauhar posed the question: "Why did you overlook Tanisha and penalize Kushal?" How could there be an answer to that, Gauhar? You just gotta accept that this is how the society works.

Verbal abuse was never an issue in BB's house until Kushal abused Tanisha. Armaan has proved to be a mentally sick person when it comes to abusing others since day one. Wasn't he the first one who suggested that Elli should strip off? I won't even get to the other ones because I cannot imagine a single person justifying Armaan's verbal abuse. And no one can surpass him in this case. Yet, BB did not reprimand him even once as Gauhar rightly pointed out.

Now coming to Mr. Salman Khan. I was never his fan when I used to watch movies. I started paying attention to him when he was linked with Aishwarya Rai cuz she was my favorite Indian actress. I did not follow up much on him but I knew that he was notorious for being abusive and short-tempered. However, after watching his few sweet interviews like the one on Priety Zinta's show, I formed the opinion that he's a good human being who requires anger management. But he's honest and loyal to his friends nevertheless. I even decided to support his Being Human brand as it recently reached this country too.

After I watched him on Big Boss, his image completely transformed. I understood why exactly anyone would find it hard to live with him. The way he sided with Tanisha trashed his image for me. Note "the way" in the sentence. His sentence, "Are dekh toh loh ladki kunse khandaan se aayi hai" still irks my ears. So by his standards if the girl does not belong to a well to-do family or is not an acquaintance of Mr. Khan then it's okay for her to be insulted just like we saw it in the case of Pratushya. I totally hated how he would go on insulting her without any feeling of guilt. During the episode in which she presented her case against Arman and Tanisha, I wished I could get into the TV and slap Mr. Khan for turning to Armaan and Tanisha and saying "Worth it?!" I also thought that Pratushya was not making a valid case and she shouldn't have brought up the topic she discussed. But I would not imagine insulting her like that in my wildest dreams. So I agree with Mr. Khan in his opinion but not in his approach. Mr. Khan having a big bank balance doesn't automatically make you a respectable person. You clearly don't have the right etiquette. I wish I could tell you that by our standards, the profession you've chosen does not suit respected families. Does that make you a disgraceful person? No because our standards differ. The point is that your views of a respectable or unrespectable family are not universal truths. As a person, I will never be able to respect you regardless of your fame, wealth, and name.

And please explain to me how can Armaan appear as someone respectable after he constantly hurls the worst forms of abuse? Oh yes he says sorry afterwards. Give me a break. He appears in his best hypocritical form when he apologizes. I would rather not have him apologize than make a mockery out of it. Mr. Khan, you have successfully killed the small amount of respect I had been nurturing for you since last two years. I would sometimes wonder why would Aishwarya Rai choose someone relatively not-so-famous over you. When I first heard of her linkup with Vivek, I would wonder WHY him. But I can totally understand why him and not you now. In short, you can be nowhere near Aamir Khan despite the fact that you're good friends with him. I wish he could give you some of his character traits so that you too could appear as somewhat "respectable" to me.

BigBoss, I could even understand Mr. Khan's partiality. He's never given a sound proof of his intellectual capacity. But why you?! How could you overlook everything that happened in the house except if you chose to have selective sight. None of that could escape the eyes of an ordinary viewer in his/her right frame of mind. If you choose to be outright partial, please don't make a mockery of yourself by preaching about fairness.

To the Indian viewers, is this how fragmented the Indian society is? This makes me feel miserable because I am a strong advocate of postcolonial theory which basically stresses that we should abandon the assumption that every Western product is refined and hence should serve as our standard while every local product is of inferior quality. So you can imagine my annoyance when people from this part of the world create things that are evidently inferior to their western counterparts. Imagine someone telling you that Big Boss can never reach the standards of Big Brother due to its biased and unfair nature.

The least I can do to protest against the explicit injustice is to abandon watching BigBoss. I know it means nothing because I am not even a TRP viewer but at least it'll make me feel better.