I don't depress you, reality does.

Friday, August 26, 2005

TV and state of Naton.

My new theory. One can assess the state of nation by watching content on local TV. Yeah, it sounds similar to " Roads are index for nation ". I know many such theories can be easily pronounced and probably will be equally (in)valid.
Coming back to my theory. I will first talk about TV content in India. We have sports channels, music channels, news channels, mixed programming channels, Faith channels, movie channels, ..
Let me tak about them in a bit more detail.

Sports Channels: Or should I say Cricket Channels. They buy rights for cricket tournaments at exorbitant prices and milk customers taking turns. Hockey, Football, Tennis, Athletics.. some of them are relevant to elite sections and some to none. Ok, one can always say, why should we blame channels for status quo. Instead of accentuating status quo, they can try to mould public opinion. They can try to make some sports look more attractive instead of pushing cricket all the time. Oh, yeah, I forgot about wwf,wwe,tna,..and other zombi variants of professional wrestling. It is a mockery of all advances civilisation had witnessed till now. What's the point in such shows? Kids trying to emulate such stuff is __________(Fill in the blank). Oh, surrogate advertisement stuff. We have liquor and cigarette comapnies making things like glassware, mineral water, awards (yes, awards) and what not to make their brands known. Why hyprocrisy on this level? Ok, I am digressing now.

Music Channels: We need foreign exchange. So we export all female clothes except lingerie to earn that. Whatever is left is displayed on music channels. Get some punjabi (looking) guys and 8-10 fair skinned girls , make them do some standard routines under garb of Bhangra, if possible get a afro american or white guy to dish out some inane words at regular intervals,..
And remix, my understanding goes like this. Get some nice old song. Add the same club beats or whatever, show a dj who acts as if he has come from some other planet, .. Is this all what is left to music? Please educate us about genres of music, please don't ape western stuff all the time, please differentiate yourselves,..

Faith Channels: O God , O prabhuva (telugu translation), meditation, lyrics, miracles, faith healing, comparision of religions, standrad practises, ...Given a chance I will kill all participants on these channels in a gas chamber on the charges that, they are posining society.

News Channels: Did anything happen? Blame govt. Some thing didn't happen, blame govt.
You caught someone taking 100rs bribe. Sensationalise that. Somebody dying on road, start blaming sombody, start showing opinions all the while showing blood covered gory imagery. Never ask right questions. Be aggresive without reason. Sell your soul for advertisements. Urban population is the only population thats news worthy. Predict everything and anything. Never care to correlate results with your predictions. Blame insensitivity of everybody else. Given a chance, I will hand over to them more cruel punishments that I do to sermonizers on faith channels.

Movie channels: They aren't primary culprits. They are culprits in that they can't do anything about quality of films they transmit.

Mixed Programming: Kyuki, saas, bhahu, pati patni aur woh, ghosts, telebrands, award shows, gossip, ads interrupted by programming, ... Please, please somebody show me one thing I can like about such channels.
I know I am being too negative about stuff on idiot box. Let me talk about somethings I like.

I like cartoon network and pogo in parts. I like CNBC, Discovery and National Geographic and such channels for more time than I dislike them.

If my theory about correlation of content on tv and state of nation is right, then this nation is in a bad shape. And I see no hope. :(

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