Remember our childhood days? Where each group of friends had one ‘fatty fatty boombalatty’? A ‘kanjoos’, a ‘stinky’, or a ‘takloo’? Remember how jokes about a friend’s prodigious girth or a problematic digestive system, were staple and would have us all rolling on the floor with mirth? No pretentions of BoPo (body positivity for the unlearned) for miles around.
Well, no more. A joke such as that would have a brigade of the Woke descend upon us out of nowhere. These social justice warriors are aplenty in today’s priggish times and their sole aim in life is to take away our simple pleasures. One cannot joke about complexion, body shapes, ancestry, the socially downtrodden, the Brahmins, the poor, the rich, nothing. And suddenly, all the jokes that made one slap one’s thigh in uncontrollable bouts of giggling at a few years back, now start seeming problematic.
It is making life for standup comedians exceedingly hard too. Remember how their fare mainly comprised women, women shopping, women gossiping, women driving, women’s kitty parties? Well that is now out. Joke thus and you may find yourself at the receiving end of the ‘cancel culture’. So is the case with jokes about wives and their cooking. Jokes on the deaf, the plump, the blind, Sardars (the best ones are narrated by Sardars actually), ‘Madrasis’, all gone too. Politically incorrect you see. Btw what is the difference between this new term ‘politically correct’ and just ‘correct?’ Stumped you, didn’t I? My only hope now is that hair oil does not get banned as the guys with glistening barren craniums are feeling offended.
Wokeness is affecting upbringing of our kids too. One whack on the nut was the preferred corrective action by parents to set an errant kid straight in our days. And we took this in the right spirit. We ate what the mom put on the table, or not at all. No longer. Teachers then, always prized physical action and never shied away from corporal punishment. They had this knack of contacting one’s posterior with a thick wooden scale and a generous arm swing to incentivise kids to do their homework the next time. A deft but agonising yank on one’s ear was another ‘teacherly’ knack deployed to build a kid’s character and prepare him for the rigours of life ahead. And I think, we all turned out pretty fine. I do not think any one of us has been adversely affected by such straightforward corrective techniques; our minds are at peace, with no hint of childhood traumas having an everlasting impact on our psyche.
Remember Enid Blyton? Aah what joy her books used to give kids. The adventures of ‘The Famous Five’ and ‘The Magic Faraway Tree’ were what made life wondrous for us kids amongst the daily tyranny of teachers, school bullies, stern parents, and exams. No more. Even her books are under scrutiny because they are deemed unacceptable in today’s world!. People are now finding her ‘racist, prejudiced and a sexist’. Sigh! At this rate, nursery rhymes will be next. Tell me would reciting ‘Three visually impaired mice’ have the same kick as reciting ‘Three Blind Mice’? No, right? Tell that to the Wokes.
Come across a friend who having attended a lecture by some Guru suddenly becomes religious? The one who stops drinking alcohol, spouts spiritualism and generally makes an ass of himself? Well so is the case with a newly awakened Woke. He starts calling his wife/girlfriend ‘bae’, consumes only a plant based diet (no wonder they are always ‘hangry’), changes his ‘fam’ and suddenly chucks up his job to dedicate himself to fighting injustice.
A month later when the electricity bill becomes overdue, he realises that the Govt Electricity Board guys are surprisingly ‘unwoke’ and care two hoots about depletion of the ozone layer, injustices in society or the threats that iguana habitats face. They need cash. Cash is also needed for maid servants cause ‘adulting’, while a good subject to prattle about, is quite a pain in-the-you-know-where actually. Reluctantly therefore, he crawls back to his ex Boss, but his yearning for changing society keeps burning somewhere deep down. These individuals can be depended upon to make life miserable for the HR honchos. And kill the mood at any office party.
Thank God for the Armed Forces – the haven of the ‘unwoke’. Having spent three and a half decades in uniform, I can say, with some pride that Wokeism has been prudently kept at bay. You create a snafu, you get an adroitly administered boot. You are late for a meeting by five minutes, you mentally fortify yourself for, and duly get, a bigger boot. You ‘ghost’ your duties and well you guessed it – out comes the boot again.
Your uniform (turnout as it is quaintly called in the Forces) is not found up to the mark? You will be, as night inevitably follows day, humiliated in public. And no one cares that your uniform is mass produced and against ‘conscious capitalism’. There will be no unnecessary time consuming ‘interviews’ with HR on how you can be helped to turn in a better performance. There are no ‘uncle like’ coaches to encourage self-improvement by delving deep into the inner you.
No one in the Forces will be too impressed with ‘cultural appropriation’ if you suddenly decide to wear a pink ribbon in solidarity with some cause. What you will have, is a boss who will tell you exactly what to do with that ribbon, what is expected from you, and what is wrong with you; in clear, wonderfully vivid and evocative vocabulary. Sample – The sun does not shine through your butt. No communication problems there. Bosses in the Armed Forces are not concerned in the least bit about your childhood fears, your family circumstances and your hormonal imbalances. All they want to hear is “Sir, yes Sir, will be done Sir”. And the Fauji system has stood the test of time and works just fine. It is to my mind, if not ‘lit’, definitely ‘dank’; where everybody lives ‘IRL’. Hope it continues so.
A word of admiration for Abhay Deol before I end. The Hindustan Times reported – “Actor Abhay Deol, who recently slammed ‘woke Indian celebrities’ and their social media posts about the Black Lives Matter movement, has asked if they’ll stop endorsing fairness creams now.” Now THAT is Woke. Bravo. And with that ladies and gentlemen, I will ‘bounce’.
PS – I have filched generously from a lovely article by Vikram Bora in the ToI 29 Jan 2024.
Beautifully said!
Thank you Patanjali
Excellent article Sir.
Thanx Baldev