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Back in the 1960s, noted Hindi writer Krishan Chander had written one of his most hard-hitting stories, ‘Jamun Ka Ped’. A satire on red-tapism in its own right, a lesser-explored theme in ‘Jamun Ka Ped’ is its subtle revelation of the devious penchant people, in general, hold towards ‘tamasha’. For the past few weeks, India has been witnessing what can easily be called one of the most excitement-inducing murder mystery tales. With a dead hero, a cruel girlfriend who apparently practises witchcraft (mostly because she hails from a Bengali family!), smokes up marijuana (drugs, drugs, drugs!!), is less successful than her now-late boyfriend (and so, obviously, a gold-digger), and has a brother and a father, who apparently drugged her rich boyfriend for their own gains, the story has had an entire nation on the edge of their seats. This is all everyone talks about now, making one wonder if Sherlock Holmes was ever this famous at all in this country of mystery-lovers.
The only catch is that even though it has become more popular in India than any other fiction, it’s not a fictional tale. It’s real people and their real lives.
The past few days have probably revealed the formidable strength of an unjust media and a story-hungry audience. Much like a stubborn child who is distracted by her mother by means of fairytales and ghost stories during lunch-time, the past few days have witnessed the Indian audience (not citizens) be awed away by “exasperating farrago of distortions, misrepresentations, and outright lies,” or “gonzo”, as MP Shashi Tharoor would call it.
It can be safely remarked that non-commercial journalism died a silent death two decades ago. Today, news is more a matter of consumer-based algorithms that exist to define political opinion and direct consumer choice.
And who would know it better than a modern-age writer who sees the arachnidian webs of algorithms unfold before him every day?
Recently, writer Devaiah Bopanna remarked, “You don’t have to buy the media if you buy into people’s curiosity.” In a brief social media post, Devaiah explained just how algorithms fed the world’s biggest democracy’s anger and led it to the deepest fold of the gonzo quagmire.
We were fortunate to have Devaiah share his opinion with Homegrown, and so, here’s Devaiah, in his own words.
“Can you scroll past a monkey on cocaine? You can’t. So, one day, while scrolling you stop, and click on the play button only to see Arnab [Goswami] jumping up and down like he is paid by the Prime Minister. Suddenly, the algorithm notices this. Feeds you with more Rhea [Chakraborty] videos on your Facebook feed. You fall for one of them, open it on YouTube. Great, now YouTube knows. The next time you open YouTube, your homepage is filled with more Rhea videos. This time, you just click on two more. You forward one of them on your WhatsApp groups. More people open it on their YouTube, more people’s algorithm gets programmed to feed them with Rhea videos.
Welcome to the algorithm of hate.
Speak to the elders in your family and ask them if they are aware of a search button present on YouTube. Or, have they searched for videos on YouTube. You will be in for a shock. Chances are, they just watch what’s on their homepage. What’s on their homepage? Whatever was on WhatsApp. What was on WhatsApp? A YouTube link someone found on Facebook. What was on Facebook? A broken, middle-aged and unloved Arnab popping his eyeballs out while talking about Rhea, drugs, rave, sex, Bollywood, cocaine, movies, ganja, MDMA and hash. What would you click on? This, or upsetting news about vaccines and mounting deaths due to a pandemic? Be honest. I know what I have clicked on. I know, we are helpless and I know for sure that we can’t be blamed.
Now suddenly, Google and Facebook start feeling the pressure. Heck, we have increased demand on Sushant and Rhea but where is the mall (content) to supply bro? Do we have enough quality content to feed the curiosity that we have only piqued? Shit. OK, just push anything with Rhea+Drugs+SSR+Ganja. Boom. One news organisation will talk about Rhea’s Dog Doing Drugs. Algorithm sees ‘Rhea+Drugs’. The news organisation sees the views. They have broken into the algorithm of hate. Congrats, friend! Now they start doing anything and everything that has the keywords Rhea+Drugs. It’s a view fest. It’s a shit fest. It’s a content engagement fest. It’s the advertisement fest. It somehow ends up becoming a money fest.
So let us get this straight: One person killed himself. One person smoked weed. One person supplied weed. One person is in jail. But well, news channels made all the money in the process.
A broken man can’t break the country. You don’t have to buy the media if you buy into people’s curiosity. Amit Shah knows this. [Narendra] Modi knows this. Arnab knows this. Deep down, even we know it. Data and algorithms have put Rhea behind bars, but it will be weird outraging against something which physically doesn’t exist. You can’t outrage your own curiosity. You shouldn’t. It’s human nature.
But it is the duty of the State to protect our curiosity and behaviour from the machinery that misuses it at scale. It is called the fourth pillar. Sure, Arnab started it, but there are forces greater than him at play to bring us here. At what point are we going to come down on these platforms for gaming our life based on our own behaviour. At what point are we going to break this algorithm of hate? This is exactly why we newspapers have editors. Because if we left it to the crowd to pick what they want to read, they will pick murder, drugs, suicide over a pandemic, GDP and cross border skirmishes any day.
Life is so bad right now that we are looking for escapism in news cycles. And no, this is not our fault if the evil forces at play build a platform where the news gets curated according to our curiosity. It is so sad that we have reached a point where news media doesn’t even have to be bought anymore. An innocent girl can be sent to jail but just playing with our curiosity and psyche. But a man guilty of wiping out jobs, stunting growth, and mismanaging the pandemic still ends up being the good guy here.”
Devaiah Bopanna is a former Bangalore boy who is on the cusp of a mainstream mid-life crisis. He is thinking of getting a tattoo and biking to Ladakh. Follow him everywhere—on Instagram (@devaiah.bopanna), Twitter (@devaiahPB) and Facebook. But, um, don’t follow him on his way back home. Just a tad bit creepy?
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