ArpitGarg's Weblog

A lot of celebrities were shamed, trolled for speaking their mind on intolerance. According to me they have every right of sharing their feelings. No one can take that away.

Somewhere media belittled the issue by highlighting the cases of Shahrukh and Aamir. What started off as celebrity trolling was relegated to an issue with religious undertones. In reality it was not just about the two superstars, a lot of writers were trolled too who did not share the same religion. But this angle was forgotten.

I want to explore the celebrity shaming issue in totality. I feel that even if Akshay Kumar would have said what Shahrukh said, he would have been subjected to the same. I am not defending the social media abuses that were hurled at anyone who said the country is intolerant. I am trying to understand why these celebrities were taken to task.

What I feel is, when common people saw these well off people cribbing about intolerance, somehow the anger erupted. It was like, when common Indian were struggling for water, food, shelter, the people who have everything were busy cribbing about first world problems.

I was talking to a friend of mine and he had this to say. “So the country is too intolerant for these stars who have all the luxuries in the world. They who spend most of time abroad, whose children study abroad, who have havens abroad, they find the country intolerant. By that reasoning, we who have no money to go abroad and have been living in India and will continue to live in India, are ch****a.”

People might have perceived it as rubbing the salt in their wounds. I don’t think it was related to national pride, as it was related to being laughed at. A rich person cribbing is never a humble figure. Feeling is like, “they crib with all the wealth, we who don’t have much should commit suicide then”.

Better would have been if these celebrities would have cribbed after donating part of their wealth. It would have given them some moral weight. In the absence of that, they came out as greedy people who are not content even with the entire world at their feet.

I might be wrong here. But this is what I feel.