Lesson for Bollywood

The lessons from flops of recent years for Bollywood should be clear to them by now.

- They must STOP yelping on social, political, religious or caste or other contentious issues and stop attending protests, rallies they hardly know much about and stop acting like public intellectuals on social media. Some stars behave like political workers or political trolls or voice of nation. Better stop it.

In past Amitabh was smart enough to stay away and keep quiet on emergency when rest of Bollywood spoke for or against it. His family did support Gandhis though due to friendship with them. Other actors like Vinod Khanna, Danny, Shatrughan Sinha, Dev Anand who spoke against Emergency and took part in protests began to get targeted and began to get less work in films and Govt ensured their films were shown less on Doordarshan and their songs were not played on AIR. While likes of Amitabh, Amjad and Dilip Kumar, Lata, Rafi ruled airwaves as they followed govt diktat quietly and kept sharing stage with rulers wherever they were invited.

Amitabh, Rekha, Asha types are still clever and hardly speak on any issue and keep diplomatic stance. Amitabh also advised Rajinikanth against getting into politics.

Khans, Kareena, Kashyap, Taapsee, Kangana, Akshay, Twinkle, Sonam, Ajay, Naseer, Akhtars etc suffer because of taking some stand or speaking on some issue or taking some issue in some film or show they did. Likes of Alia suffer purely because her father, parents openly criticise BJP on Twitter and in media. Though Alia has never said a word on any issue.

Varun was also targeted for speaking on police assaulting students at JNU, Jamia. Rhea was partly targeted for speaking on JNU issue on Twitter.

It is better if filmstars and makers just remained what they are. Focused on their craft.

Their being more known for personal life or stance on various issues rather than their work is backfiring on them.

Aamir or SRK or Saif were better off when they were known more for their films and ads or stage shows than their personal life or social, political or religious views. Kangana also single handedly keeps ruining own reputation and diverts focus from her films herself. Sadly her films flop too and she is no longer known for films as she was known at time of TWMR, Queen.

As citizens they have FoE and it is fundamental right to speak what they want but getting too much into social or contentious issues backfires and gives bait to politicians and trolls to target the artist and their work.

Amitabh learnt it hard way when his career and reputation entirely nose dived after joining politics and INC in 1984. Rajesh Khanna also lost remaining part of career after joining politics.

Hema gets all brick bats thanks to her statements post joining politics and Sunny Deol also began getting more flak after joining politics. Diljit stopped getting work in Bollywood after taking stand on farmer issue online.

These things only invite backlash. Nothing else and cause polarisation. Akshay gets bashed from both RW and LW thanks to his wife and his own past films like OMG. Ajay gets bashed for being close to BJP. Salman got bashing for supporting Modi.

Stars often take sides to benefit from political patronage but do not realise how it backfires and polarises people, makes them target of opposing side.

There is also NO need for Indian stars to act as some mediators or diplomats who will be ambassadors and improve ties of India with other countries be it Canada, Turkey or China or Pakistan.

Even normal visits are used against stars.

Stars should keep personal life and faith personal too. Why post pics of your visits to religious places? Or what is name of your baby or whether you had beef or what meal? It has its price. Earlier stars were better off keeping their families away and private life private.

In recent years cricketers and stars have been trolled for even having beef on their menu or old interviews of eating beef. Ranbir gets bashed simply because Rishi once tweeted he was a beef eating Hindu. WTF is need to discuss your eating habits with others in public?

Finally stars must stop silence and take LEGAL action against media platforms, pages, YouTube channels and TV channels spreading lies, false propaganda against them and cyber bullying their kids. Akshay had sued a YouTuber for defamation last year. Why can Khans and others do same and get those pages or channels banned that spread lies about them, attribute false statements to them and harass their kids online? Ira is trolled by all Aamir haters. Why Aamir cannot take action against ones targeting and cyber bullying his daughter?

Silence of stars and still being in denial or ignoring malicious rumours spread against them by a particular IY cell is not only ruining their present but will ruin their perception of past legacy also.

Just stop getting too much into social or religious or political issues and STOP rumours against you and your family. Counter fake news against you. Focus on films ONLY and make films audience can relate to. Stop ruining it for yourself and audience for political patronage.

Today a normal citizen is not spared if he/she share a meme on SM, ye toh phir stars hai.

Chup chap apna kaam karo & ghar jao.

But yaar they live in a democratic country. Celebs are humans first and have opinions. People nowadays are behaving like talibanis 😰 kuchh bhi ni bol sakte, if public hates you they will make a controversy out of anything.

Originally posted by: teri_Sanem

But yaar they live in a democratic country. Celebs are humans first and have opinions. People nowadays are behaving like talibanis 😰 kuchh bhi ni bol sakte, if public hates you they will make a controversy out of anything.

I know you are right. But we live in a regime where even ordinary citizens and students are jailed for liking posts or sharing memes.

Or fired from jobs or expelled from college for SM posts.

This is a vindictive regime and anti democratic. Of course all stars have right to public opinion and support whatever ideology they want but they sometimes need to keep quiet for own sake. Amitabh does same since burning his hands in 80s and suffering all through 90s due to foray in politics. Kishore Kumar was also banned from AIR and replaced with copycats for speaking against Emergency in 1975.

This is era of undeclared emergency and pliable masses easily fooled by SM and media propaganda in name of faith and nationalism. Why to give them fodder by discussing openly what you eat, like Rishi bragged about eating beef or flaunting your faith or atheism etc?

Atul Kulkarni's old tweets are also being used to bash LSC just because he said he was atheist and not a Hindu. Stars and filmmakers are being harassed for own beliefs and result is there to see.

Rishi Kapoor actually faced stone pelting outside his house, RK studio and on his car for his beef comment in 2015. Bhansali was slapped. Prakash Jha was attacked for making Aashram. Bollywood either gotta keep quiet or take legal action rather than saying things, apologising later or keeping quiet later after saying things earlier.

"people have become talibanis"

sure coz boycotting movies is the same as getting someone's hands cut or stoning them to death

I think this over sharing on SM by young actors is an issue,

not jist political opinions but also their lifestyle, they all live in a bubble and they are not aware that we are in a country where economic disparity is huge

flaunting your wealth, privelege, foreign holidays, destination weddings in my opinion leads to resentment. they also start questioning these ppl have so much money through and then the quality is so crap and i am paying for it. especially post covid this amplified. also the connection is lost as they no longer belong to the same category as the audience

The biggest difference they can make is just make nice films. Anything else is good but not required.

Originally posted by: blahhhh

if celebs have FoE and live in democratic country then so do we,nobody hit aamir,we only boycotted his movies.

He can't lie about hindus being intolerant (when it is his community which goes around beheading people) and cry about lack of democracy when his movies are boycotted.

Lying and peddling agenda should have consequences.

It is absolutely appalling that hindus have to give more explanations over boycotting movies than muslims have to give over all the violence they carry out peacefully all over the subcontinent(and beyond)

Anything that cuts into their personal wealth should be a no no. That is the only rule

Not just young but even old actors over share. Ranbir paid price for his dad Rishi's tweets. Ranbir himself is not on SM officially.

And WTF was need for Atul Kulkarni to tweet things like 'what makes you think I am a Hindu? I am an atheist'?

Most political, religious tweets come from older actors and filmmakers.

Young ones only include Taapsee, Swara and Kangana who post too much on contentious issues.

I also dislike Sara posting her religious place visits. That only causes more trolling by people of all faiths. I wonder if she does it to play victim later that she gets trolled by fanatics of all sides?