Hypocrisy lives, Democracy dies!

People are opportunists and even more so the politicians. Politicians and political parties stalk, wait and attack the smallest of issues and ensure that they are blown out of proportion. The intentions could be as ambitions as affecting global politics, taking down the opposition government or simply gaining limelight to show that they exist.

Recent events saw a political party in India come out strongly against the networking group Orkut. They demanded a ban on Orkut because there were defamatory comments and communities against their party leader and a state hero. Along the way, we all may have come across such communities against countries and political leaders because of a certain stand they take/took while addressing an issue. On most occasions, being politically correct and rationally correct seem two isolated concepts. Political correctness might irk a whole lot of us because it seems that the benefactors are only a small section, more often then not, the politicians themselves.

In their protest, members of the particular political party vandalised and ransacked cyber cafes, simply because Orkut was accessible. The abuse could have been from anywhere in the world, but a few innocent cyber cafe owners suffered.

The world has been blessed with the cyber bliss but also doomed with the hacks and crimes. I am sure most of us use networking communities to socialise, catch-up with long lost friends, communicate with friends and family, do business and so on. (Ironically, families of the political party involved in the ‘ban Orkut’ protest, themselves are very active Orkut members.) There can always be the other section of the crowd on these networking sites as well. Sadly, petty matters like these have been taken up to the Honourable President and Supreme Court, when there are bigger and more serious issues to be addressed.

Wouldn’t it be easier to report defamatory communities as abuse and have them blocked rather than ban a site like Orkut; or worse attack cyber cafes and innocent people associated with them? Are these acts of violence justified? Recently, The United Nations (UN) declared 2nd October as ‘World Non-Violence Day’ in memory of Mahatma Gandhi, India’s ‘Father of the Nation’; the man who helped India achieve freedom through non-violence. The very political parties praise Mahatma Gandhi but choose violence in daily practice.

Hypocrisy lives and Democracy dies! Sadly, on most occasions, people BECOME THE ISSUE rather than ADDRESSING IT!

You can support the petition ‘Do not ban Orkut in India’ by signing online at http://www.petitiononline.com/orkutban/petition.html.