DHAKA TRIBUNE
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Op-Ed T
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Monday, August 18, 2014
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‘Pakhi’ dress, three deaths, and a divorce ing these deaths as mere accidents, society has to carefully deconstruct the impact of shows, mainly those that are not even made in Bangladesh. Wanting the Pakhi dress is totally normal. For decades, dresses worn by Indian actresses have influenced fashion in our country. What is disturbing, and possibly not noticed immediately, is that along with showering us with unnatural bevahioural patterns, these serials insidiously inject a high degree of irrational emotion into our lives.
Adults in our society are not detecting the adverse impacts of dramas that sow seeds of unreal sentiments
Evoking irrational emotions into our lives?
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n Towheed Feroze he sartorial rage this Eid, according to many sellers of women’s dresses, was the Pakhi dress as shown in the Star Jalsha serial Bojhena se Bojhena. So much has been the craze surrounding this style that for everyone, from young children to adults, “Pakhi” was at top of the list. It’s all good, but there is a dark side to this fashion obsession which has reportedly resulted in at least three deaths and one divorce. As per newspaper reports, the youngest victim of this fashion mania was a class II girl who took her own life as her father did
not, or possibly could not afford to buy a Pakhi costume for her. The other deaths occurred for the same reason while the breakdown of the marriage was because the wife felt that since her husband was not in a financial position to meet her demands, it’s better to end the union for good. First, let’s concentrate on the suicides, especially by young girls who were obviously ardent fans of the Indian serial: There is nothing wrong in preferring one show above others, and there have been plenty of instances, here in Bangladesh too, when plots shown on TV broke the barrier dividing fantasy from reality. Going back in time, we remember
Kothao Keu Nei, a Humayun Ahmed TV drama, where in the last episode a central character called Baker bhai was to be sent to the gallows after being found guilty of murder. Before the final episode, people around town brought out vocal processions demanding that Baker Bhai be spared by special amnesty in the end. However, tragedies always have lasting impact, and therefore, the writer did not alter his story. People mourned the death, albeit on a TV show – proof that often dramas can touch a very human chord. In retrospect, the ending in that plot where Baker bhai is hanged could have been changed because the case
against him, as framed in the plot, was not strong enough to justify the death sentence. In any case, the evaporation of the line between fiction and fact is not uncommon, though when the results are loss of lives, the entire culture of TV entertainment needs to be re-evaluated. Sometimes, escapism into a make-believe world does wonders for human resilience. The problem starts when the dividing line disappears. It’s only natural that style will emerge from popular outlets of entertainment. There will be blind following too. Now, with some heartbreaking consequences, instead of just dismiss-
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The truth and media n Syed Ishtiaque Reza
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ocial Welfare Minister Syed Mohsin Ali is still a hot topic in the media. Journalists across the country are demonstrating against him. The minister, in a program on indigenous people in Sylhet, recently said journalists are “dirty chaps and of bad character.” At one point, he told the photojournalists not to take his pictures, and also asked the newsmen to leave the venue. About the national broadcast policy, Mohsin said: “Had I been present in the cabinet meeting that day, I would have pressed for making it a tougher one.” Earlier on July 22, he came down hard on journalists, and said a law would be formulated to make sure electronic media had no freedom. Taking a dig at journalists, the minister said newsmen did not know how to deal with people, and they always misinterpreted things. He claimed the prime minister praised the comments he had made earlier about the media and journalists. This was the gist, although he has made many other filthy remarks about journalists. The same way Shamim Osman, another very famous member of parliament from Narayaganj, at a TV talk show last week, said newspapers and the overall media have had too many motivated reports and comments about him and Narayanganj. Syed Mohsin Ali sought apology, and in the same way Shamim Osman said he did not say that every newspaper or media house is bad. But we can understand the overall attitude of the people in power regarding the media in Bangladesh. What do our journalists actually do in Bangladesh? Not only newspapers or television channels, but blogs, local newspapers, and even public comments on Facebook try to depict the local perspective. If everybody speaks up, loudly and clearly, the truth can make its way to the limelight. But there are many people who do not like this. They get very angry because newsmen are always trying to unearth the truth. How can they like journalists when they illustrate who killed whom, how the godfather net-
work is maintained, how public funds are plundered, what corrupt practices are going on, how encroachers are occupying rivers, canals, ponds, and even playing grounds? We conduct journalism in a society where geographic, political, historical, and economic hindrances are so very strong they suffocate the facts and deface the reality. The powerful quarters always believe that they can rule, or should rule, by suppressing the truth. But the reality is that the truth never dies. The modern, vibrant, and blunt media is always on a move to dig out the truth. So journalists are really bad people to those who always want to kill the truth.
The role of media is to expose the truth, and with that, educate society
Let us understand the role of media in a society. Primarily, it is to expose the truth, and with that, educate society, build opinion, and transform it into a collective strength. A fair and unbiased media should always keep the readership/audience away from sensation, delusion, fantasy, and fabrication. The Bangladeshi media, despite all hindrances and pressures, despite all the limitations of its workforce, try to showcase the problems of the common people in addition to covering the statements of political leaders or their activities. We know our readers and audience. They are quite smart. We cannot satisfy them with only protocol speeches. They do not like stories that glorify someone or something. It is highly difficult to retain viewership or readership by just pushing them into a world of fantasy for a vested interest and commercial purpose. We also need
to know that media is a business too. It has commercial risks and limitations. So, we need to retain the viewership or circulation to sustain the business. In a developing country like Bangladesh, we are to fight for the rights of the people, to end corruption, or draw attention to environmental hazards – things that have a large impact on our society. It is not the ministers, the MPs, or the bureaucrats who will dictate to us which truth the media should be an ambassador for. Think of two situations – a minister will attend a wedding today and the people of Narayanganj passed one more night under threat. Both are truths, but a professional media house will prefer to cover the latter one. Yes, surely our media is largely engaged with celebrities or politicians. Journalists usually focus their attention on such stories and distance themselves from the truth and the real problems faced by the people. But we have to make an effort to break away from ministerial and protocol news and lay our eyes on real issues like human rights violations, corruption, nepotism, poverty, environmental hazards, economic challenges, and political oppression. Our ministers love to give lectures on objectivity, but they like the type of journalism which does not depict the problems people are really facing. In fact, media people know their business better. They realise that the age of print monopoly has passed and people do not only rely on TV channels for information. There is hardly any scope in the profession right now to compromise the truth. This is what must be realised by the ministers, MPs, or bureaucrats. The reality is that if a minister or MP, or any government agency, can convince or compel one newspaper or TV channel to hide something, more are there to dig it out. The media in Bangladesh cannot remain ineffective in bringing about social awareness and fasten the society together for a common collective wisdom. l Syed Ishtiaque Reza is Director of News, Ekattor Television.
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The suicides would not have happened if the victims were not obsessed with the dress to the point where without it, life seemed meaningless. Talk about consumerism taken over the edge of reason. Coming to the separation of the husband and wife, where the latter allegedly decided to end the marriage, it sounds downright silly. Perhaps countless marital discords have also happened over the Pakhi costume of which we have no further details. The bottom line here is that we are allowing TV culture to break into the real world to wreak havoc. Neutrally speaking, most of the serials are highly dramatic, featuring convoluted plots and certain characters that are beyond reproach. In heavy make-up which transforms a person’s real face, actors come in to deliver their intense dialogues. Adults, mostly women and, sorry to say, a lot of men, sit transfixed in front of the TV, with children soon joining in. So much is the impact of the serials that in general family situations,
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reference to characters on TV are made regularly. Even major social occasions are now avid real-life enactments of customs portrayed on TV. Imagine young children, from the tender age of five, being indoctrinated by Machiavellian machinations of family life. From another perspective, Indian soap operas have gotten a large number of TV viewers under a hypnotic spell. On the other hand, our dramas and shows are not allowed in India. So, this is one-way traffic or what many people call “cultural aggression.” While many of our shows are copies of Indian programs, there are quite a few that still retain originality. Time to admit, harm has been done because under the relentless bombardment of contrived plots, we have started to make our productions equally kitschy. It’s disconcerting that the adults in our society are not detecting the adverse impacts of dramas that sow seeds of unreal sentiments in our young. Nor is the authority slightly concerned. When the satellite culture began, we opened our skies to the world allowing in a plethora of entertainment. After decades of monotonous TV shows, this sudden change left us overwhelmed. A myriad of cultural material was absorbed in a short time, leaving us somewhat bewildered. The young girls took their lives because they were the helpless victims of this whirlpool of conflicting cultural practices. In their distorted understanding of life, acquisition of the Pakhi dress seemed the ultimate goal. Regrettably, parents and guardians cannot avoid taking responsibility for the deaths and the divorce because their inactivity is also to blame. Firstly, they did not demarcate a line between the real and the unreal worlds. Secondly, despite knowing that our programs are not aired in India, they blithely carried on watching foreign programs. One is puzzled as to how the “Bangladeshi” identity can be held firm when our character is so feeble. l Towheed Feroze is a journalist currently working in the development sector.
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The future of television
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n Mohammad N Miraly
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inema will soon become a theatre-like experience, with only a handful of mega-budget pictures released for longer runs, in order to get the biggest box-office results. In this mass-appeal landscape, the art of story-telling and the focus on character relationships will have to find a new home. Nowadays, though, it seems like they’ve gotten pretty comfy on our couches. Television is now the bastion of depth. It’s where we go to get to know interesting characters, and where we invest most of our time exploring complicated stories and relationships. Considering that high-grossing feature films have become more expensive to produce; people are spending more time at home; and there’s a whole host of new on-demand services, TV has become both a viable story-telling and money-making alternative. The focus in coming years will be on what I will call “pay-and-play” services, where people at home can watch an increasing library of lowbudget feature films as well as the new medium of “episodic features” – tightly-scripted episodes of shows that
have in-depth character development and narratives laced with the structure and metaphor of novels. While HBO shows like Deadwood and Carnivale are paragons of the episodic feature, Netflix has taken the lead in pushing a new hybrid narrative form – the 13-hour movie. By releasing its shows all at once, instead of one episode a week, Netflix seems to have accepted that people are less inclined to start a two-hour feature film than they are to watch continuous episodes of a one-hour show. With budgets rivalling Hollywood blockbusters, these shows create an experience similar to a feature film, but allow viewers to delve deeper into the characters and the relationships, and, importantly, give them control over the experience. Such shows are a risk, but Netflix seems to have caught onto current viewing trends and presaged the future. Part of what Netflix caught onto was that people today are so overwhelmed with information that they have developed shorter attention spans. We are more inclined to watch three-minute YouTube stars and 30-second Instagram shows than to expend the effort on carefully crafted
two-hour long films or 250-page novels that explore the depths of human nature. One might speculate here that this new reality is a result of an increasingly individualised urban society, complemented and fostered by a ceaseless advertising machine that supports a culture of knee-jerk consumerism. But what it does reflect, nonetheless, is that more of us now have the luxury of time. Time buys the freedom to choose to sit at home and watch TV, and it also buys the space to ponder our own natures. The hashtag existentialism of Twitter society reflects the quintessential human need to explore our natures. A big part of the appeal of episodic television is the ability to do that – we build a relationship with characters and take part in the development of their lives. Basically, television today is like catching up with an old friend. Except you’re alone in sweatpants on a sofa. #netflixandcarbs. l Mohammad N Miraly is an educator and film producer. He holds a PhD from McGill University in religion, ethics, and public policy, and is the author of themiralyblog. wordpress.com.