Policing Adults

Though I try and keep commentaries on political issues off my blog, there are times when amazing stupidity prevails in the universe despite there being plenty of sane people around. I’ll come around to that later in the post.

The latest case in point is that of TV channels being blocked in Maharashtra by a court ruling because of a PIL that accuses them of showing adult content that is termed as potentially damaging to kids. The said channels include HBO, Star Movies and AXN and these have been off the air for around a fortnight.

Which brings us to this minor point-how exactly do we define objectionable content?

By acceptability? Are the saans bahu soaps being widely screened across channels with their crazy plots of jealousy and scheming in families healthy food for thought for a kid? For that matter, are raunchy videos being aired on music channels okay too?

Indian channels today lack depth. With all channels striving to provide round the clock entertainment, it is no surprise that their quick fix solution to the programming shortage is to approve sub-standard content that gets the TRP’s up, however temporarily. And steamy content is the surest way to TRP heaven.

The court seems to say that this tendency is perfectly fine, as it seems to escape unpunished. But channels like HBO and Star that bring us ‘phoren’ content have, by default, no morality and thus should be blocked

If I remember correctly, Star stopped showing 18 rated movies after the mid-nineties. All the movies that are shown nowadays happen to be rated a max. rating of UA with a viewer discretion warning flashed at the start of the movie (To be fair HBO does not follow the same system).

If channels like Star movies could be banned, it would be for showing repetitive content. Because I don’t seem to find any objectionable content on channels like Star and HBO.Maybe that’s because that I’m an adult. And want to see movies depict adult issues. And adult issues do not mean smut.

I also seem to remember that most of the little ‘objectionable’ content I’d seen when I was a kid was beamed locally by the Cable guy. My parents reacted to objectionable content by changing the channel which seemed to work just fine then. And by teaching me to know the difference between good content and bad.

Which I guess is too much to expect from parents of today. They expect the government to make up for their inability to keep their kids from watching stuff on TV that they are not supposed to. They also cannot delete the objectionable channel from their TV or use the child lock feature that is available in many TV sets today. And they seem to be oblivious to the fact that to deny a kid anything is the surest way to get him interested.Or to the fact that every objectionable material is just a click away on the net or freely available at the friendly neighbourhood movie pirate.

But they do expect my tax money to help the government play benevolent nanny to parents who clearly aren’t doing their jobs right. Am I supposed to pay for diaper changes too?

Enforcing morality and ensuring that his or her child has the right influences while growing up is the respective parent’s job-not the government’s.

But as I pointed out at the beginning of my post, stupidity prevails. Mostly because the sane sorts are too busy getting on with their lives to act. A point that I have touched upon earlier in this blog.

Which is precisely why a litigant who has admitted in a newspaper interview that she thinks cartoons on TV are violent has succeeded getting the court to block channels instead of looking at saner alternatives.

But as they only affect India’s adult population of around a billion people, no one cares much.

Touché