If you are watcher of mass psychology then past few weeks have been what may be called - very interesting times.
First a boring bit of intro to ease my way. Irrespective of what we believe, man and woman and their kind are pure herders. They flock. One leads the other and others follow the leaders and they are followed by more. Until, at some point they don't know why or what they are doing. It is madness of crowds and its delusions.
So what’s interesting in past weeks?
There were many. Here is a bits and pieces account of them.
The Olympics
If you are an Indian when was the last time you watched Athletics Olympics? The scam-fested Commonwealth Games perhaps. Or going by its TRPs, none. When was the last time you say through awkward events of archery, shooting or wrestling - probably never? When was the last time your hope for Olympic gold medal was so close? Is it hard to remember?
But for almost one full month, I have seen people turn to Olympics and go gung-ho about characters or plots we have never heard before. Mary Kom is suddenly a hero! What a wonderful feeling of a mother of two capture entire country's attention! Blissful!
[BTW, proud of the guys medal winners or not, and all the Olympians. And Ajay Makken.]
The Anna Hazare Fast
Anna Hazare again took the country by storm. No surprise in there. Whenever this old man has fasted, entire nation in riveted in hope. Hope and arguably bordering on mass delusion of a silver-bullet legislation that can redefine their lives from poverty to comfortably rich. No doubt Anna Hazare's fasts have captures attention like no other. He is the Master Shepherd.
The Ramdev Fasting
The original Black-Economy pundit but late comer to the fasting scene, gathered up the storm that surprisingly surpassed the other original-fasting guru - Anna Hazare. I guess, the winds were blowing correct for Ramdev. The stadium full of people protesting peacefully inside and horrendous traffic jams outside, and clueless law enforcement, all the signs of mass psyche in action.
The Ek Tha Tiger
The massive response to Ek Tha Tiger. Yes, its is Salman, the Eid, the holiday and the Kat-effect but it is still a mass response. 100% occupancy on every screen it released and some 15-20 shows per multiplex! That’s crazy! Definitely a symptom of a herd.
Would it be different if we released it some other time? Most probably yes. Producers definitely timed the release well, fanned the publicity and the positive feedback did the rest.
[Can some other films this season emulate ETT or beat it. My bet, its possible.]
The Dark Knight Rises
The global version of ETT. Nearly a billion dollar take-in in five weeks, and with more markets to be released. Batman mania continues and should rake in about a $2billion and few million fans by the time this subsides.
The Aurora / Wisconsin shooting
This was crazy and a tragedy. Its painful and haunting for its survivors and the families of victims. However what is also to be noted is how marvelously every one came together to condemn both massacres and spoke in one voice.
A sad event, but highlights people can become one.
The Paul Ryan
The unknown dude just swept all the headlines. The Presidential nominee, err the Vice-Presidential nominee, has hogged the timelines ever since. Perhaps more has been written - few in favor, more in critic - enough to fell Amazon forest thrice over. Thank God for internet!
Just like Anna, Ryan too captured the mindspace of the entire nation overnight.
The CAG scam - redux (to power of Three)
With all the holidays, boring workdays and Olympian distractions, we thought we could breathe easy? CAG really hates us I guess. It brought us back to this miserable world with evidences of scams that beat comprehension.
Seriously, I don't know how many zeros are there on these numbers. All I know is that if I were to be paid Rs 1 Crore per hour, 8 hours a day and 250 days a year, I would have a confirmed job for 93 years! And that’s from just from one scam, other swindles are icing on the cakes.
If there was any "forgetting" of the CWG, Radia, Adarsh, NHRM, Noida land, Iron ore mining, Land denotifications, forest encroachments, Defense bribe-n-purchase, missing irrigation canals, leaking international airports, and zillion other nasty repressed memories, CAG stokes more fire. Good for CAG and India. Bad because we are back in the We-Are-Broke-And-Corrupt mode.
[Btw, Kudos to CAG]
The Mumbai riots
God knows what was this all about. It was as if a Bollywood film shooting gone serious. The plot was pathetic. Whoever planned it was insane and left trail of bread crumbs. Guys who pelted stones and burnt buses with pseudo-religious conviction soon lost their steam.
It was like a badly executed botched up B-grade movie. Wish they had some sense not to do it in first place. But ever so "resilient" Mumbaikar (oh so snobbish and hypocritical is that!) was back as if a fly had scratched his surface.
Mobs are bad. They don't see reason. Only the first person to throw has a reason, rest is all feedback.
The Great Northern Trip
Hmmm so 600 million people in India were without power for two days. Big thing eh? Big one indeed. You can't start to describe the chaos caused to people and people who caused more chaos. Both go hand in hand. That’s the feedback loop. So basically for two days 600 million people in India were powerless (oh ya sir, pun definitely intended)
The "Independence Day Patriotism" boom
I wanted to skip this because this is probably the first Independence Day when my inbox was not inundated with jingoistic messages. Thankfully, I was out of steam lying through my teeth and fingers to those messages. Thankfully, too most of the well-wishers seem to have moved to Facebook - in all color and detail. Oh! How glad I am about that. It just made sure I don’t open FB for two days. Time saved.
There is nothing mob-ish here but the very fact we get gung-ho and celebrate the Independence Day when 99% of population is living below-potential and scarcity, kind of stinks. It’s not hope for we have been hoping for past 66 years. It’s not a plan for we have nothing on paper to make it happen. It’s just a delusion that we are free.
[We are not free.]
The Eega
A little snippet and probably my favorite. The biggest grosser in Hyderabad and Chennai film industries [I don't know what "-wood" is that] is a film where the protagonist is a FLY. A fly killing a veteran villain with large army to boot. Can you imagine that?! And guess what, people just lapped it up - Hook, Line and Sinker.
Can you imagine a fly beating the toughie?! Can you foresee its intelligence, strategy, communication, linguistics etc. Doesn't matter enjoy the movie.
[BTW, and Eega (Naan ee) is an excellent movie. The SFX is better than that of Rajni's Robot. And a story much more believable! LOL]
And the King of all The Flash Mobs: The North-East Exodus
What does it take to make nearly 50000 people drop their jobs, schools and leave cities? Few SMS and MMSes, Veracity and Authenticity of which were least bothered about.
The sheer scale of movement of people, many uprooting themselves, driven by the fear - nameless and unsubstantiated - indeed beat every other event that we have seen in past few weeks.
It is sheer baffling that such a mass exodus of people can be so easily triggered by handful of motivated-SMS.
Continued in Part 2 here
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