Adventures with untruth

Taboo? Fear? Inhibition? Shame?

What are you talking about? There is surely nothing on the television or the daily papers that cannot be discussed by one and all. Anywhere. From a panchayat meeting in the interiors of Himachal Pradesh to a ‘cooking with wine’ get together for bloggers at the Cheri in New Delhi… from a family sitting around and talking in their living room to a few seasoned managers enjoying their evening tea in some library… from a couple glancing furtively as they cavort under a tree in Talkatora garden to Raghu Rai leading a battery of enthusiastic photographers for an animated discussion – whatever be the scenario in your mind, the world has suddenly become an open place where no topic is ‘not to be approached’, not even those where breasts and cancer come together.

I love the world as it is now.

Just look at the men and women with their suave smiles as they answer question after question that Rajdeep Sardesai is bombarding at them. They hop from one crisis to another, from one scam to another without as much as even an imperceptible twitch of their eyebrow. They look into each other’s eyes and mouth all the lies that their fertile brains can come up with in the nano-seconds that television today grants them. They’re fast and furious and they know how and when to dig in their heels and stick to their guns. They also know when and how much fire power to use. They’re the politicians and the bureaucrats and the opinion leaders out in the open. They’re unafraid. No topic unnerves them. They’re ready to tread on any topic that is ready to fall on their feet… even sanitary napkins if they choose to do so!

I love the world as it is now.

Zoom onto the super highway at the clip-clop tonga speed that 2G gives or the jerk-and-dash that a slightly cost-intensive broadband connection gives and you’ll soon find out that all the men and women there are busy copying all the bold phrases and ideas that they can lay their hands on. The updates are bold. The groups are bolder. The comments are bold and boulder sometimes! And the copied ideas are smooching and kissing so many computer screens – and the mobile screens and the tab screens too, of course – and the world seems to be smiling benevolently at words prancing around as if they’ve got a free entry on some nudist beach. No one is bothered about any taboo anywhere. Taboo is just a piece of clothing that needs to be taken off and waved around the way Saurav Ganguly did when some cricket match was won, I don’t remember which.

I love the world as it is now.

The markets seem like the ramp in a fashion show these days. Yes, I’ve seen the young and the not-so-young walk with a deliberate and a nurtured gait… even a simple gesture like pulling a handkerchief out to dab out the extra oil off the forehead has become as complex as some dainty steps of a ballerina. Almost everyone is able to convince all the scrutinizing others that they can pull it off rather well. The parade is everywhere. The words spoken by them are also ever so full of worldly wise rambles and they powder all sorts of topics to make them seem more fashionable and ‘current’… almost like the recurrent currency of rapes in this world.

I love the world as it is now.

Now tell me someone, please if I have missed out anyone. Ah! The students and the learners are still left. Just look at them bunking classes and making-it-out with new friends each day… oops! every hour is what I should’ve said. They can learn and unlearn faster than the fastest operating system can reboot… and they can hop onto any topic and make a mince curry out of it in no time. You may or may not like its taste, but they can put forth points and counter-points at a speed that will dazzle your comprehension. They’re out to impress with their intimate knowledge of all the things that lurks within the swishing pages of all that Hefner and his gutsy team dishes out so often. They can squeeze information out of periods… err, of any sort.

I love the world as it is now.

We live in a world that is so full of people that sometimes we are not able to stop and hear at what all these people are really talking about. We imagine the truth and the frankness in their discussions and their topics. We have grand ideas about their levels of inhibition and openness. We imagine a world as what it is not. We are perpetually inside an adventure and creating heroes in our minds. The adventures, tough, are in the virtual realms of a thinking person’s mind and remain so until someone points out that these are merely adventures with untruth.

Was I trying to talk about women’s intimate health issues… and the hushed way that it features all around? Err… well… ahem… you are big enough to understand. Why make me repeat facts.

Women Intimate Health Discussion

This post is a part of the weekend blogging contest at BlogAdda.com in association with 18again.com

Blogadda’s ‘Tangy Tuesday Pick’

The list can be seen here.

Arvind Passey
26 August 2012

Blogadda_Tangy Tuesday Pick