Once upon a simpler time, it simply wasn’t done to wash one’s dirty laundry in public. But nowadays, when the only thing people cannot tolerate is boredom, it has become acceptable. Everybody wants to be the star of their own reality show, and we can all collectively tune in at will, as aspiring social media stars and influencers from all walks of life document the excruciating details of their lives from post-coital posts and bowel movement updates to livestreaming the agonising death of a loved one. Even that stuff has gotten old as everybody is doing it and it is impossible to muster up anything resembling enthusiasm for yet another overshare curated to grab eyeballs with a close-up view of a bellwether type’s butthole. Enough is enough! We want dirt, damn it!
Not even porn is cutting it nowadays. It is not twisted or kinky enough. Which is why shows like The White Lotus, which have managed the impossible feat of making the entire world pay attention have casually tossed incest into the mix, devilishly provoking outrage and maximum engagement. The makers may or may not have been influenced by one infamous dude who called himself the brewski bulge or something equally inane and cracked an Oedipal joke that landed him in hot water. Word is that the worst is behind him, and he is on the verge of signing a book and movie deal to monetise the notoriety, he clearly coveted. Even this obloquy is not floating our boat anymore. Here we are now! Entertain us… as Kurt Cobain famously growled in a halcyon age when only rockstars were allowed to go off their rockers to provide the starving populace their quota of the sordid and scandalous
A tech billionaire was obliging enough to spill the squalid secrets about his ugly divorce. There were allegations of an affair, demands for excessive sex, tax evasion and the world watched goggle-eyed as the exes embarked on a mudslinging match of monstrous proportions even stooping low enough to play ping-pong with their child. It was a horror-tragi-comedy and folks couldn’t get enough of it. Though most are willing to be distracted if damnable iterations of Aurangzeb and the Godhra riots end up on the big screen for them to get frenzied about.
Meanwhile, the genocide in Gaza continues unabated, although irrefutable evidence of unspeakable war crimes have been exhaustively documented. Most look the other way because they are too squeamish to view the footage of babies and pregnant women being executed, the rape of male detainees with broomsticks, and Israel’s wanton destruction of homes, hospitals, schools, mosques, and churches. Besides, it has been over a year now and it is too sad, thereby entirely lacking amusement value. Ditto the war in Ukraine and the climate crisis. This sort of thing pricks the conscience and urges us to get off our backsides and do something to make the world a less hideous place. Nobody wants that. Trump and Elon Musk, for all their faults, are never boring. They offer paisa vasool fare. So what if they are hastening us towards inevitable doom? We don’t mind as long as we get our endorphin rush every step of the bloody way!
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