Lord Krishna asked his mother in a song titled ‘Radha kyon gori main kyon kala …’(why is Radha so fair and why am I dark-skinned?). Radha, his paramour was fair and Krishna was dark. Even God could not comprehend the dynamics of color and the bias associated with it. I don’t know what Yashoda, Krishna’s mother, had to say to that.
When I first listened to the song, a popular bhajan, it echoed my concern. My mother could not answer my question.
When my cousin, a girl, was born everyone was unhappy because she was not fair enough. Concerns about her getting married into a good family and getting a good match were expressed profoundly. And then began the ardous process of applying various homemade concoctions to make her fairer.
I saw fair women on television and in print selling everything from home appliances to men’s underwear. And I was confused. Why did color matter so much? Why was I asked to put sunscreen when I went out in the sun? Why was I asked to apply Fair & Lovely cream on my face? Why was there so much importance attached to color? And why were we, the not-so-fair ones, considered ugly?
When I took up the media and diversity class, I took it to understand the questions that have evaded me all my life. I come from a conservative and middle-class family and though education, unlike in other such families, was important, being beautiful was always more important. I did not quite understand why it was so.
The complementary status accorded to women was another norm that confounded me. In ancient societies like ours, gender roles are defined and it is very difficult to deviate or follow one’s own choices in life. Women always have to compromise and it is the men who get the upper hand. It is all in the power structures of the society that recognize male supremacy, sanction it and revere it. My aunts never had a choice in selecting their husbands. The couples had never met before marriage. Not even seen each other. Such things are difficult to imagine in free society like America. But they did happen. Divorce was almost always a woman’s fault, brought about by her mistakes and immorality. Women are willful agents, wrote the ancient philosopher Manu, and must be kept in check lest they corrupt men and society. That was what I grew up with.
I went to a good English school, learned about the sacred concepts of freedom, equality and fraternity but found them lacking in my own life and surroundings.
When Muniya came to clean the toilets, she announced her arrival in a loud voice. My mother and grandmother quickly removed things from her way so that they don’t get polluted by her shadow or touch. Muniya was a shudra, one belonging to the lower castes, ordained to clean up after us. She was an untouchable.
Caste system is another issue that plagues the Indian society. Decades after it was abolished by the Indian Constitution, untouchability is still practiced in India, even in cities like Mumbai that are progressive and considered at par with Tokyo and New York City. I feel this is also done to maintain class distinction and to divide votes by dividing people in certain groups. At a film festival in Mumbai, I saw this documentary on low caste women considered untouchables and not even permitted to draw water form the village well, being raped by men from the upper castes.
One woman who was interviewed said when it came to sex, there was no untouchability or class distinctions. There was no fear of getting polluted or corrupted by the touch, she said.
I was not allowed to eat at my Muslim friend’s house because it would violate my religion and faith. And I could not share my lunch with my best friend because she happened to be from a lower caste and I happened to be from an upper caste.
I do not blame my mother or my grandmother because they are products of social and cultural conditioning and never challenged those things. They never had the benefit of a liberal education or were not born in changing times like mine.
From that far and that situation, America looked tempting. It looked perfect. And I wanted to be here. But I was surprised to learn that color is an even bigger issue in United States. Racism is big here. Whiteness is beauty. And blue collar and white collar live different lives and almost never interact. Everywhere I go, I can feel people looking at me with special interest. They make me feel exotic, from the east, from a land of poverty and strange practices and rituals and spicy food. And I never fit in. I can feel it. I can sense it everywhere. At the food courts that I work at, in the class, on the street. The color is a giveaway.
The immigrants are no better. The hyphen never goes. One is always an African-American, an Indian-American and so on. The second or third generation Indians whose parents or grandparents came here and settled are still struggling to blend in and sometimes do not mix with people of their own group in order to maintain the uniqueness or to show the white people that they shun their groups or have nothing in common with their own people so that they find acceptance in a society that they live in but never quite merge with.
Color sticks to us, it shapes our identity, and it shapes other people’s perceptions and notions. And it determines our own views, frustrations and judgments. It determines our social and group behavior. There is a sense of understanding between me and Barbra because we are both products and victims of social conditioning and prejudices. We are both considered exotic and most people think that I am a product of eastern mysticism…that’s my identity at times. And it bothers me. And it bothers me especially because in this society of black and white, the browns are always a misfit with their ‘imperfect’ accent.
Race is our creation and the definition changes to include or exclude people depending on power politics. And in order to maintain the balance of power.
As per the discussion on groups, I feel both sides are equally responsible for creating the difference. One side tries to subdue people, the other side feel victimized but accepts it. That was the problem with the so-called low caste in India. They accepted it. Muniya accepted the tea in a broken cup that my mother pushed toward her with a stick. Why didn’t she challenge it? When I asked her to sit on the chair instead of squatting on the ground, why did she laugh and thought it was such an unbelievable concept? Because they believe in the distinctions and have seldom rebelled against it and the system believes in blocking access to education so that they don’t challenge the power.
These are some of the impressions that have influenced me and have shaped my thinking. I am hopeful though. And though outside pressure in form of revolutions can change society, they are not sustainable or desirable means of change as they bring destruction in their wake and often result in reversal of power structures with the same results.
I feel education will help the most. My mother was more progressive than my grandmother and I am more open to ideas than my mother. So, it changes. It is upon us to go out, find more about other people and think rationally and do away with our insecurities.
Friday, October 06, 2006
feminist...am i one?
Probably I am a feminist afterall but of a different kind. I don't look like them... Maybe I just don't want to put myself in a slot. But I believe all women are feminists in some way. All of them, wherever they are, or whoever they are, aspire for equality and rights. It is just that culture and faith, in some cases, takes precedence. Or they are just conditioned. Freedom is every man or women’s dream.
I remember having an argument with a Muslim friend about the purdah system, about women wearing the hijab. I just could not get it at that time when he said what can one do if women want to don the hijab themselves. I sort of understand that now. First, it is conditioning and second, it is conditioning. I guess feminism goes far beyond bra-burning, lesbianism and equal rights or pay for women.
It is the hijacking of the feminist movement by the elite women that worries me. They are the pretty ones, the powerful ones, who don Gucci sunglasses and carry Louis Vuitton bags, they clamor for glamour and their moments in print or on television. It is not women’s liberation or it is not women’s rights that matters to them. The movement has become an exclusionist force, a force that has zero impact on millions of women living in poverty or shame.
What have they done for the sex workers, who still live in shanties and contract AIDS because their customers would not wear condoms? What about the women in rural areas, who have to walk miles to get a pitcher of water? What about child marriages? What about dowry deaths? What about female infanticide that has taken such proportions that it is now feared that women will disappear from some communities? What about rape? What about domestic violence, outside and inside of marriage? What about incest? What about child molestation?
The feminist movement started for all the right reasons, but has degenerated into a restrictive movement obsessed with making non-issues national stories. And they do become, lapped by an ever-biased media that sustains itself on sensationalism. I remember quite a few incidents. And I am strictly talking about India here, though from my own perceptions of the U.S. media, it fares no better. The Miss Universe pageant when it was held in Bangalore, India, invited the ire of these feminists, who then marched and rallied and spoke on television. They objected to the commodification of women, threatened to stage dharnas if the swim-wear round was not taken off from the show. Then came the controversial video where the singer’s g-strings are seen. They march again and disrupt a show saying that the singer was promoting nudity and it would lead to rapes and objectification of women. Now, these are events, not processes. And being in the media for a short time has taught me that events make the headlines and processes…well who cares for them.
AIDS is big, and even bigger is tuberculosis, but nobody frets after those. Because they are not action-oriented news. In fact these are not news. What’s topical about them? These are routine affairs.
When I watched the clips in class the other day, I was intrigued. Sexual liberation of women is good and desired but is that all? Voting rights are needed, but is that an end in itself?
During my research for a paper that I wrote on media’s coverage of domestic violence in India, I came across very interesting clips and women too. Well-known women journalists said they did not chose to write about women’s issues because they were afraid of being branded as feminists. These are powerful women, some are editors of national dailies, yet they would not take up these matters and they would fear the branding. Women’s issues have become non-issues and that’s where the danger comes from. And on top of it, the fear about being branded. Why is feminism looked down upon?
I tried thinking about the term itself. And the automatic associations took it to different dimensions. The word is now related with man-haters, lesbians and manly women, who wear loose clothes, wear their hair short and rant about men. Also, it has come to mean a profession of women, who have been rejected by men and are thus against all men and have taken up the cause of women out of bitterness, not out of love for womankind or passion for fighting for women’s rights.
When women are starving or dying slowly, still selling their bodies, they don’t have time to think about equal opportunities, or feminism. The feminist movement has to restructure itself to focus on core issues that affect women’s living status and not just their representation.
Women journalists must make an effort to address these issues. Most cases of domestic violence are relegated to briefs columns or in obscure city crime sections. The society and media have come to treat these as routine events and not social evils. A dowry death makes headlines but seldom do columns or analysis follow the publication. The media has failed the women.
I come from a traditional patriarchical society, a society that venerates male hegemony. And if we don’t fight, no one else will. We have to redefine feminism and give voice to the vloiceless. We have to reform the media by removing its obsession with TOPICAL and make it relevant to the society. We have a lot to do.
I remember having an argument with a Muslim friend about the purdah system, about women wearing the hijab. I just could not get it at that time when he said what can one do if women want to don the hijab themselves. I sort of understand that now. First, it is conditioning and second, it is conditioning. I guess feminism goes far beyond bra-burning, lesbianism and equal rights or pay for women.
It is the hijacking of the feminist movement by the elite women that worries me. They are the pretty ones, the powerful ones, who don Gucci sunglasses and carry Louis Vuitton bags, they clamor for glamour and their moments in print or on television. It is not women’s liberation or it is not women’s rights that matters to them. The movement has become an exclusionist force, a force that has zero impact on millions of women living in poverty or shame.
What have they done for the sex workers, who still live in shanties and contract AIDS because their customers would not wear condoms? What about the women in rural areas, who have to walk miles to get a pitcher of water? What about child marriages? What about dowry deaths? What about female infanticide that has taken such proportions that it is now feared that women will disappear from some communities? What about rape? What about domestic violence, outside and inside of marriage? What about incest? What about child molestation?
The feminist movement started for all the right reasons, but has degenerated into a restrictive movement obsessed with making non-issues national stories. And they do become, lapped by an ever-biased media that sustains itself on sensationalism. I remember quite a few incidents. And I am strictly talking about India here, though from my own perceptions of the U.S. media, it fares no better. The Miss Universe pageant when it was held in Bangalore, India, invited the ire of these feminists, who then marched and rallied and spoke on television. They objected to the commodification of women, threatened to stage dharnas if the swim-wear round was not taken off from the show. Then came the controversial video where the singer’s g-strings are seen. They march again and disrupt a show saying that the singer was promoting nudity and it would lead to rapes and objectification of women. Now, these are events, not processes. And being in the media for a short time has taught me that events make the headlines and processes…well who cares for them.
AIDS is big, and even bigger is tuberculosis, but nobody frets after those. Because they are not action-oriented news. In fact these are not news. What’s topical about them? These are routine affairs.
When I watched the clips in class the other day, I was intrigued. Sexual liberation of women is good and desired but is that all? Voting rights are needed, but is that an end in itself?
During my research for a paper that I wrote on media’s coverage of domestic violence in India, I came across very interesting clips and women too. Well-known women journalists said they did not chose to write about women’s issues because they were afraid of being branded as feminists. These are powerful women, some are editors of national dailies, yet they would not take up these matters and they would fear the branding. Women’s issues have become non-issues and that’s where the danger comes from. And on top of it, the fear about being branded. Why is feminism looked down upon?
I tried thinking about the term itself. And the automatic associations took it to different dimensions. The word is now related with man-haters, lesbians and manly women, who wear loose clothes, wear their hair short and rant about men. Also, it has come to mean a profession of women, who have been rejected by men and are thus against all men and have taken up the cause of women out of bitterness, not out of love for womankind or passion for fighting for women’s rights.
When women are starving or dying slowly, still selling their bodies, they don’t have time to think about equal opportunities, or feminism. The feminist movement has to restructure itself to focus on core issues that affect women’s living status and not just their representation.
Women journalists must make an effort to address these issues. Most cases of domestic violence are relegated to briefs columns or in obscure city crime sections. The society and media have come to treat these as routine events and not social evils. A dowry death makes headlines but seldom do columns or analysis follow the publication. The media has failed the women.
I come from a traditional patriarchical society, a society that venerates male hegemony. And if we don’t fight, no one else will. We have to redefine feminism and give voice to the vloiceless. We have to reform the media by removing its obsession with TOPICAL and make it relevant to the society. We have a lot to do.
terrorism...who defines it?
Look Into My Eyes
Look into my eyes
Tell me what ya see
U don’t see a damn thing
Cuz u can’t relate to me
U blinded by our differences
My life makes no sense to u
I’m the persecuted one
U the red, white and blue
Each day u wake in tranquility
No fears to cross your eyes
Each day I wake in gratitude
Thankin’ God He let me rise
Ya worry ‘bout your education
And the bills u have to pay
I worry ‘bout my vulnerable life
And if I’ll survive another day
Ya biggest fear is getting a ticket
As ya cruise your Cadillac
My fear is that the tank that’s just left
Will turn around and come back
Yet do u know the truth of where ya money goes
Do u let the media deceive your mind
Is this a truth that nobody knows
Someone tell me
…See I’ve known terror for quite some time
57 years so cruel
Terror breathes the air I breathe
It’s the check point on my way to school
Terror is the robbery of my land
And the torture of my mother
The imprisonment of my innocent father
The bullet in my baby brother
The bulldozers and the tanks
The gasses and the guns
The bombs that fall outside my door
All due to your funds
You blame me for defending myself
Against the ways of my enemies
I’m terrorized in my own land
What, and I’m the terrorist
… So if I won’t be here tomorrow
It’s written in my fate
May the future bring a brighter day
The end of our wait- Outlandish
I came across the lyrics while searching for something on the net. It is so true and so sad. It is just how you look at it. Or how the media shapes your vision or distorts it that you don’t see the pain but only the threat. And then we discriminate.
Sometimes, I feel lost here. I feel sad when I keep saying the same thing in my classes and all I get is a blank look. It is like knocking on doors that perhaps will never open up. I feel frustrated at these times and I wonder how big is a task it is for the people form the Middle East to get themselves understood, to say their religion is not terrorism or they are normal people living in terror.
What is terrorism? The definition seems to be shifting depending on which side of the world you are. The media defines it for the west. It brands Muslims, makes it common knowledge that Muslims are arrogant people, who are violent and fanatics.
When I met the 18 journalists from the Middle East and Europe who came to Syracuse University as part of a program sponsored by the state department, I saw how eager they were to get themselves understood, to tell them about their lives, their views and explain they are not against Americans but the American government’s foreign policy.
Amer Jomah does not want to go back to his country. A journalist form Iraq, he told me how dangerous it is to live in Iraq, how difficult it is to go out and just have coffee at a café. You don’t do those things there, he told me. After sunset, there is nobody on the roads. Jomah does not see the situation improving there. When I offered to visit Iraq, he laughed. He thought I was mad. It is dangerous, he warned. And then a girl in my class said how Americans did not kill or kidnap journalists like the Iraqis and how her mom would kill her if she went to Iraq. I wondered if it is not us who had screwed up in Iraq and now are afraid of even going there. What about the people there? What is the media doing? Why is it silent? Is it not approving of the government’s policies or the people’s biases in its silence?
I wanted to change the world. Sometimes, I wonder if I can.
I belong to the ‘model minority’ and I have never dealt with a negative image myself. But I understand how it must feel when people call you names and link you to terrorists
I met the journalists at my religion class and then later at Sheraton hotel where they were staying. Marek Kubicki, a journalist from Poland, asked me to come. So, I went expecting others to be there too. But except for one girl from my class, there were no students there.
We started talking. Except for Kubicki and a journalist from Denmark, most felt United States was too good. I agreed but only partly. I told them about racism, Hill TV incident and they were shocked. I don’t know why I did it. May be to shatter the myth about United States. That reminded me of my own feeling when I came to United States. I had thought everything to be wonderful here. I could not believe that racism existed here. They could not either. I asked them, “What did you think…you will find rivers of milk and honey here? That everything is equal here.”
But that’s what the media has led them to believe. That America is great. That it is a land of opportunities, of freedom and of equality. The images show the good life in America, the great universities, the retail stores and the happy people. What they seldom show is the poverty here, the inequality here.
Look into my eyes
Tell me what ya see
U don’t see a damn thing
Cuz u can’t relate to me
U blinded by our differences
My life makes no sense to u
I’m the persecuted one
U the red, white and blue
Each day u wake in tranquility
No fears to cross your eyes
Each day I wake in gratitude
Thankin’ God He let me rise
Ya worry ‘bout your education
And the bills u have to pay
I worry ‘bout my vulnerable life
And if I’ll survive another day
Ya biggest fear is getting a ticket
As ya cruise your Cadillac
My fear is that the tank that’s just left
Will turn around and come back
Yet do u know the truth of where ya money goes
Do u let the media deceive your mind
Is this a truth that nobody knows
Someone tell me
…See I’ve known terror for quite some time
57 years so cruel
Terror breathes the air I breathe
It’s the check point on my way to school
Terror is the robbery of my land
And the torture of my mother
The imprisonment of my innocent father
The bullet in my baby brother
The bulldozers and the tanks
The gasses and the guns
The bombs that fall outside my door
All due to your funds
You blame me for defending myself
Against the ways of my enemies
I’m terrorized in my own land
What, and I’m the terrorist
… So if I won’t be here tomorrow
It’s written in my fate
May the future bring a brighter day
The end of our wait- Outlandish
I came across the lyrics while searching for something on the net. It is so true and so sad. It is just how you look at it. Or how the media shapes your vision or distorts it that you don’t see the pain but only the threat. And then we discriminate.
Sometimes, I feel lost here. I feel sad when I keep saying the same thing in my classes and all I get is a blank look. It is like knocking on doors that perhaps will never open up. I feel frustrated at these times and I wonder how big is a task it is for the people form the Middle East to get themselves understood, to say their religion is not terrorism or they are normal people living in terror.
What is terrorism? The definition seems to be shifting depending on which side of the world you are. The media defines it for the west. It brands Muslims, makes it common knowledge that Muslims are arrogant people, who are violent and fanatics.
When I met the 18 journalists from the Middle East and Europe who came to Syracuse University as part of a program sponsored by the state department, I saw how eager they were to get themselves understood, to tell them about their lives, their views and explain they are not against Americans but the American government’s foreign policy.
Amer Jomah does not want to go back to his country. A journalist form Iraq, he told me how dangerous it is to live in Iraq, how difficult it is to go out and just have coffee at a café. You don’t do those things there, he told me. After sunset, there is nobody on the roads. Jomah does not see the situation improving there. When I offered to visit Iraq, he laughed. He thought I was mad. It is dangerous, he warned. And then a girl in my class said how Americans did not kill or kidnap journalists like the Iraqis and how her mom would kill her if she went to Iraq. I wondered if it is not us who had screwed up in Iraq and now are afraid of even going there. What about the people there? What is the media doing? Why is it silent? Is it not approving of the government’s policies or the people’s biases in its silence?
I wanted to change the world. Sometimes, I wonder if I can.
I belong to the ‘model minority’ and I have never dealt with a negative image myself. But I understand how it must feel when people call you names and link you to terrorists
I met the journalists at my religion class and then later at Sheraton hotel where they were staying. Marek Kubicki, a journalist from Poland, asked me to come. So, I went expecting others to be there too. But except for one girl from my class, there were no students there.
We started talking. Except for Kubicki and a journalist from Denmark, most felt United States was too good. I agreed but only partly. I told them about racism, Hill TV incident and they were shocked. I don’t know why I did it. May be to shatter the myth about United States. That reminded me of my own feeling when I came to United States. I had thought everything to be wonderful here. I could not believe that racism existed here. They could not either. I asked them, “What did you think…you will find rivers of milk and honey here? That everything is equal here.”
But that’s what the media has led them to believe. That America is great. That it is a land of opportunities, of freedom and of equality. The images show the good life in America, the great universities, the retail stores and the happy people. What they seldom show is the poverty here, the inequality here.
are newspapers dying???
When Janet Cooke told the story of ‘Jimmy’, an eight-year-old boy in a low-income neighborhood of Washington D.C., who was addicted to heroin, she thought she would get away with it. And she did. She even won the Pulitzer Prize for the moving story that appeared in Washington Post on Sept. 20, 1980.
It took months for the editors to find out that “Jimmy with velvety brown eyes and needle marks freckling the baby-smooth skin of his thin brown arms” did not exist. He was her creation. The Pulitzer was taken away from Cooke and she was sacked.
Examples of fabrication, plagiarism and using composite characters in journalism are many. Many have committed these and got away like Cooke did. And in an age, where Internet has empowered the readers with fact-checking abilities, it is imperative that journalists should be more careful than ever in order to retain and in some cases, regain the credibility.
“We have to bring humanity back into journalism,” said Jeff Jarvis of Buzzmachine.com at a panel discussion on ethics and journalism at The New York Society for Ethical Culture Wednesday.
Research shows that trust in the media has declined. People are beginning to trust a fellow citizen’s comments or reviews more than that of a journalist. And with online medium gaining ground and many of us choosing to click the mouse instead of buying newspapers, it has become very essential that we tread carefully and be thorough with our research and facts and establish that we don’t mess with facts, that we have the correct information. This means a lot of work but the age demands it.
When I visited my brother and his family in Detroit, I got up in the morning and went downstairs expecting to find the newspaper. I did not. Alter, I was told they did not subscribe to any. They preferred to read news online.
Many feel that newspapers will soon become extinct and that they already are an endangered species. With Internet changing the media landscape, it is increasingly becoming a challenging task for editors and reporters to retain their readership and maintain credibility, while transitioning to online format.
What this means is that newspapers, in order to survive and thrive, have to change form and change content. Breaking news is most suitable for the online media. What I can read the previous evening online, I would not want to see it on the front page of the newspaper that I buy in the morning because it is stale news. I believe the newspapers have to veer toward public service journalism and focus more on analytical and in-depth reporting and come out with solutions. This is just one of the examples.
There are many sides of the story now instead of just focusing on the two sides that we are supposed to as journalists. Any story can be told in a million ways and that’s precisely what the bloggers are doing. They give a million more perspectives. So, as creators of information, we have to learn more, read more and be receptive to a lot of different, maybe conflicting views. We have to be innovative. And the first step toward doing that is that we have to view blogging or the online medium as a collaborative force and not an adversary.
The managing editor of Time magazine, Richard Stengel, who was another panelist, said blogging and pod casting signifies the flowering of a new kind of journalism. When everyone can be a fact-checker, the responsibility to be accurate and truthful increases manifold, he added.
“The key to survival is how to reckon to all that,” he said. I could not agree more. As a student and a journalist, I am worried about my profession and I feel concerned when others tell me that they don’t trust us.
I believe and I agree with Jarvis that instead of newspapers getting frustrated with the whole deal of saving their papers, it is essential that media organizations redefine their relationship with the public. Citizen journalism, as some call it, has become a trend and people are now increasingly posting their comments, reports and even videos on the web. The Internet is vast and unlike the television industry, it is not regulated. Nor does it knows boundaries or is limited to countries.
I know at this moment my thoughts are coherent. I was talking with my roommate the other day and his comments made me think. He said in an age where small kids are hooked on to the Internet, the possibility of newspapers continuing in the future looks bleak. Surely, there was some truth in that statement but I don’t believe the newspapers will ever die. Because we survived the television and the radio, I am hopeful we will overcome this crisis too.
I still buy my newspaper, at least one. This way I hold on to my faith in my profession and I contribute to the survival.
We have seen so many changes already. With journalism becoming “functional journalism”, I am afraid the real issues will never surface and ethics are slowly being kept aside to keep the revenues. I am scared of an age where newspapers will completely forget their loyalty to the citizens and will only become a medium for propaganda and trade.
But I am hopeful. I chose this because of the passion I felt for writing and reading and I am sure there are enough who care. I urge all of us to think and be more responsible because it is crucial for us to continue.
Internet is a friend and let us all embrace it and work out a way for both to exist. Blogging is good but it lacks the discipline. Bloggers are not accountable. They can contradict us but as professionals, let us be the watchdogs and help people know the truth. Blogging can help with presenting various viewpoints and as a source of story ideas for us….but let us work toward a new future where newspapers are at every doorstep.
It took months for the editors to find out that “Jimmy with velvety brown eyes and needle marks freckling the baby-smooth skin of his thin brown arms” did not exist. He was her creation. The Pulitzer was taken away from Cooke and she was sacked.
Examples of fabrication, plagiarism and using composite characters in journalism are many. Many have committed these and got away like Cooke did. And in an age, where Internet has empowered the readers with fact-checking abilities, it is imperative that journalists should be more careful than ever in order to retain and in some cases, regain the credibility.
“We have to bring humanity back into journalism,” said Jeff Jarvis of Buzzmachine.com at a panel discussion on ethics and journalism at The New York Society for Ethical Culture Wednesday.
Research shows that trust in the media has declined. People are beginning to trust a fellow citizen’s comments or reviews more than that of a journalist. And with online medium gaining ground and many of us choosing to click the mouse instead of buying newspapers, it has become very essential that we tread carefully and be thorough with our research and facts and establish that we don’t mess with facts, that we have the correct information. This means a lot of work but the age demands it.
When I visited my brother and his family in Detroit, I got up in the morning and went downstairs expecting to find the newspaper. I did not. Alter, I was told they did not subscribe to any. They preferred to read news online.
Many feel that newspapers will soon become extinct and that they already are an endangered species. With Internet changing the media landscape, it is increasingly becoming a challenging task for editors and reporters to retain their readership and maintain credibility, while transitioning to online format.
What this means is that newspapers, in order to survive and thrive, have to change form and change content. Breaking news is most suitable for the online media. What I can read the previous evening online, I would not want to see it on the front page of the newspaper that I buy in the morning because it is stale news. I believe the newspapers have to veer toward public service journalism and focus more on analytical and in-depth reporting and come out with solutions. This is just one of the examples.
There are many sides of the story now instead of just focusing on the two sides that we are supposed to as journalists. Any story can be told in a million ways and that’s precisely what the bloggers are doing. They give a million more perspectives. So, as creators of information, we have to learn more, read more and be receptive to a lot of different, maybe conflicting views. We have to be innovative. And the first step toward doing that is that we have to view blogging or the online medium as a collaborative force and not an adversary.
The managing editor of Time magazine, Richard Stengel, who was another panelist, said blogging and pod casting signifies the flowering of a new kind of journalism. When everyone can be a fact-checker, the responsibility to be accurate and truthful increases manifold, he added.
“The key to survival is how to reckon to all that,” he said. I could not agree more. As a student and a journalist, I am worried about my profession and I feel concerned when others tell me that they don’t trust us.
I believe and I agree with Jarvis that instead of newspapers getting frustrated with the whole deal of saving their papers, it is essential that media organizations redefine their relationship with the public. Citizen journalism, as some call it, has become a trend and people are now increasingly posting their comments, reports and even videos on the web. The Internet is vast and unlike the television industry, it is not regulated. Nor does it knows boundaries or is limited to countries.
I know at this moment my thoughts are coherent. I was talking with my roommate the other day and his comments made me think. He said in an age where small kids are hooked on to the Internet, the possibility of newspapers continuing in the future looks bleak. Surely, there was some truth in that statement but I don’t believe the newspapers will ever die. Because we survived the television and the radio, I am hopeful we will overcome this crisis too.
I still buy my newspaper, at least one. This way I hold on to my faith in my profession and I contribute to the survival.
We have seen so many changes already. With journalism becoming “functional journalism”, I am afraid the real issues will never surface and ethics are slowly being kept aside to keep the revenues. I am scared of an age where newspapers will completely forget their loyalty to the citizens and will only become a medium for propaganda and trade.
But I am hopeful. I chose this because of the passion I felt for writing and reading and I am sure there are enough who care. I urge all of us to think and be more responsible because it is crucial for us to continue.
Internet is a friend and let us all embrace it and work out a way for both to exist. Blogging is good but it lacks the discipline. Bloggers are not accountable. They can contradict us but as professionals, let us be the watchdogs and help people know the truth. Blogging can help with presenting various viewpoints and as a source of story ideas for us….but let us work toward a new future where newspapers are at every doorstep.
Friday, September 29, 2006
media and us...crime and its perpetrators
When we talk about crime and its coverage in the news media, we are mostly looking at manipulated truth, truth that is mostly distorted and edited to capture the most dramatic elements. Crime sells and that’s universal. I am not much familiar with news programs here but in India there has been an onslaught of late-night crime news broadcasts that cover everything from witchcraft to burglaries. The perpetrators shown are mostly people from the slums, the underprivileged ones. Here, they are mostly black or Hispanics. Crime has a face and it is mostly black or of a poor man. They are shown as threats to the society.
When I was in Baltimore for the winter break, I was advised not to be in the downtown area after 4 p.m. as there are mostly blacks there and they are criminals. Crime rate is pretty high in Baltimore and many people think it is because most blacks stay there and also because of poverty. It is a vicious circle. Blacks are criminals because they are poor and they are poor because they are stupid and arrogant, attributes of a black person, largely supported and maintained by the media.
I will talk about my country because that’s familiar ground. There is a group of people, mostly tribals, who were classified as criminal tribe by the British because the rulers thought these underprivileged people were intrinsically criminal and went so far as to brand them. After independence, the nomenclature changed but the category remained. And the media did not do much to address it. As I read Dilip D’Souza’s Branded by Law, a book that explores the tribe and its travails as a result of this branding, I felt betrayed by the media. We seek the truth as audience but do we ever get nothing but the truth. I guess never.
The book is a remarkable attempt by D’Souza to portray the deep-set prejudices in India against certain communities through his own interactions with the DNTs especially the ‘Pardhis’ and the ‘Sabars’ tribes. It is also a well-researched documentation of the historical and social context, which pushed the community to the periphery of civil justice and social life depriving them of the basic human rights.
He describes his personal encounters with the people once branded as criminal and now after being denotified, continue to live in the shadow of their derogatory branding.
In course of his examination of the various laws which were passed to for a repeal of the Criminal Tribes Act in 1952, after India became independent, not much has been done to uplift the DNTs. One incident that really set me thinking was the murder of Limbu Jayaram Bhosle ‘s husband (both Pardhis) because he happened to steal pomegranates to appease his pregnant wife’s desire. Is that what being criminal is? And does the media have no responsibility toward clearing misconceptions? By keeping quiet, media says a lot.
The most interesting thing is that D’Souza also draws a comparison between the bias against certain categories of people in the US and these tribes here. He talks about gypsies, blacks and other communities in various other countries who also suffer from distrust and prejudice and all the evils that come along with them. And that seems to be so true. I remember watching the promos of a certain program called the Cops or something like that and almost all the cops were white and the criminals were black, which goes on to prove media’s branding and its selective treatment of crime.
As a creator and distributor of information, I see an urgent and inherent need to be unbiased and reflect social or crime issues.
Curbs on the freedom of movement, grinding poverty and lack of opportunities have resulted in generating an attitude of frustration and anger in the DNTs in India and blacks or Hispanics in United States toward the society. As I understand, the social alienation and isolation of communities have largely been responsible to a great extent for civil strife and agitations.
The faith that people repose in the media is reflected by the account of Mithun Gongajya Shinde of Rajale village urging D’Souza to publish the photographs of the people of his community so that the people come to know about their conditions. Media has a tremendous task to fulfill in a country where the prejudices are so deeply ingrained.
The fact that the DNTs still continue to live in clusters and have not yet achieved absorption in the society is a mockery of democracy and the fundamental rights. Media acts as a watchdog of the society and the issue of DNTs has to be treated as a social disorder by them for a complete restoration of the lost dignity to these hapless people.
The socially oppressed must rise and it is the fourth estate’s obligation to bridge the gap and erase prejudices. The lack of political will to better conditions must be compensated by media’s will.
When I was in Baltimore for the winter break, I was advised not to be in the downtown area after 4 p.m. as there are mostly blacks there and they are criminals. Crime rate is pretty high in Baltimore and many people think it is because most blacks stay there and also because of poverty. It is a vicious circle. Blacks are criminals because they are poor and they are poor because they are stupid and arrogant, attributes of a black person, largely supported and maintained by the media.
I will talk about my country because that’s familiar ground. There is a group of people, mostly tribals, who were classified as criminal tribe by the British because the rulers thought these underprivileged people were intrinsically criminal and went so far as to brand them. After independence, the nomenclature changed but the category remained. And the media did not do much to address it. As I read Dilip D’Souza’s Branded by Law, a book that explores the tribe and its travails as a result of this branding, I felt betrayed by the media. We seek the truth as audience but do we ever get nothing but the truth. I guess never.
The book is a remarkable attempt by D’Souza to portray the deep-set prejudices in India against certain communities through his own interactions with the DNTs especially the ‘Pardhis’ and the ‘Sabars’ tribes. It is also a well-researched documentation of the historical and social context, which pushed the community to the periphery of civil justice and social life depriving them of the basic human rights.
He describes his personal encounters with the people once branded as criminal and now after being denotified, continue to live in the shadow of their derogatory branding.
In course of his examination of the various laws which were passed to for a repeal of the Criminal Tribes Act in 1952, after India became independent, not much has been done to uplift the DNTs. One incident that really set me thinking was the murder of Limbu Jayaram Bhosle ‘s husband (both Pardhis) because he happened to steal pomegranates to appease his pregnant wife’s desire. Is that what being criminal is? And does the media have no responsibility toward clearing misconceptions? By keeping quiet, media says a lot.
The most interesting thing is that D’Souza also draws a comparison between the bias against certain categories of people in the US and these tribes here. He talks about gypsies, blacks and other communities in various other countries who also suffer from distrust and prejudice and all the evils that come along with them. And that seems to be so true. I remember watching the promos of a certain program called the Cops or something like that and almost all the cops were white and the criminals were black, which goes on to prove media’s branding and its selective treatment of crime.
As a creator and distributor of information, I see an urgent and inherent need to be unbiased and reflect social or crime issues.
Curbs on the freedom of movement, grinding poverty and lack of opportunities have resulted in generating an attitude of frustration and anger in the DNTs in India and blacks or Hispanics in United States toward the society. As I understand, the social alienation and isolation of communities have largely been responsible to a great extent for civil strife and agitations.
The faith that people repose in the media is reflected by the account of Mithun Gongajya Shinde of Rajale village urging D’Souza to publish the photographs of the people of his community so that the people come to know about their conditions. Media has a tremendous task to fulfill in a country where the prejudices are so deeply ingrained.
The fact that the DNTs still continue to live in clusters and have not yet achieved absorption in the society is a mockery of democracy and the fundamental rights. Media acts as a watchdog of the society and the issue of DNTs has to be treated as a social disorder by them for a complete restoration of the lost dignity to these hapless people.
The socially oppressed must rise and it is the fourth estate’s obligation to bridge the gap and erase prejudices. The lack of political will to better conditions must be compensated by media’s will.
media and us...continued
“Muslims have hatred in their hearts,” said one Indian student who I met at a common friend’s house. We were all talking about religion and suddenly the conversation veered to Muslims and Pakistan. The guy then went on to convince me about his statement regarding Muslims. He argued that terrorists were mostly Muslims or in fact most Muslims were terrorists. He used the two words as synonyms.
The recent controversy regarding the Danish cartoons and subsequent conversations made me think. I am no spokesperson for Islam. But it made me uncomfortable to see a few of my classmates say that Muslims are arrogant and the Danish paper was just exercising its freedom of expression. They have problems with the reaction that has Muslims all over the world burning embassies, protesting and issuing fatwas. I have a problem with that too. But they do not understand or consciously fail to understand that Muslims are a set of people and not just violent terrorists.
What is the freedom that we are talking about? The media images of Muslims are almost always negative, a bunch of crazy fanatics out there to take on the western world. Why can’t the media be more responsible? Why can’t they be fair? Almost all the initial reports that I read in the papers or the internet had no moderate Muslim speaking or expressing his views. The views were extremist and I feel the newspaper, and I am talking about the U.S. media, had an agenda, to defend what the Danish paper did. What is the justification for publishing those cartoons? Just to show that WE CAN DO IT or we are the champions of freedom of expression. Well then, that’s their expression and the whole world does not go by the western world’s liberal views. They are an entity and we need to respect that.
Why do we attribute arrogance and anger as being characteristic or defining features of a community? How much of effort do we make to understand and be tolerant of those of other faith and regard them as individuals? And should we not do it considering the present situations?
I am a First Amendment and freedom of speech and expression person but I think one must not be insensitive and hurt anyone’s religious sentiments. Religion is dear to people. And a lack of understanding of other religions or groups can lead to negative stereotypes that can in turn create fierce group loyalties. When people think there identity is under threat or their background is misunderstood, they start becoming a closed group. This is what the world at present is dealing with in case of Muslims. They are branding them and creating a stereotype, a negative one.
And we talk about white and black. That’s important. But I think it is not only about color now. There is a different kind of racism, something that is orchestrated and will have more serious ramifications if the media does not get its act together. Blacks were portrayed as evil or bad, but Mulsims are being shown as terrorists. Who is fighting for them here? That’s something for us to think about.
Section 2
The recent controversy regarding the Danish cartoons and subsequent conversations made me think. I am no spokesperson for Islam. But it made me uncomfortable to see a few of my classmates say that Muslims are arrogant and the Danish paper was just exercising its freedom of expression. They have problems with the reaction that has Muslims all over the world burning embassies, protesting and issuing fatwas. I have a problem with that too. But they do not understand or consciously fail to understand that Muslims are a set of people and not just violent terrorists.
What is the freedom that we are talking about? The media images of Muslims are almost always negative, a bunch of crazy fanatics out there to take on the western world. Why can’t the media be more responsible? Why can’t they be fair? Almost all the initial reports that I read in the papers or the internet had no moderate Muslim speaking or expressing his views. The views were extremist and I feel the newspaper, and I am talking about the U.S. media, had an agenda, to defend what the Danish paper did. What is the justification for publishing those cartoons? Just to show that WE CAN DO IT or we are the champions of freedom of expression. Well then, that’s their expression and the whole world does not go by the western world’s liberal views. They are an entity and we need to respect that.
Why do we attribute arrogance and anger as being characteristic or defining features of a community? How much of effort do we make to understand and be tolerant of those of other faith and regard them as individuals? And should we not do it considering the present situations?
I am a First Amendment and freedom of speech and expression person but I think one must not be insensitive and hurt anyone’s religious sentiments. Religion is dear to people. And a lack of understanding of other religions or groups can lead to negative stereotypes that can in turn create fierce group loyalties. When people think there identity is under threat or their background is misunderstood, they start becoming a closed group. This is what the world at present is dealing with in case of Muslims. They are branding them and creating a stereotype, a negative one.
And we talk about white and black. That’s important. But I think it is not only about color now. There is a different kind of racism, something that is orchestrated and will have more serious ramifications if the media does not get its act together. Blacks were portrayed as evil or bad, but Mulsims are being shown as terrorists. Who is fighting for them here? That’s something for us to think about.
Section 2
entries - media and us...
When my teacher in high school called me a lesbian just because I was a fan of this basketball player in school who happened to be a girl, I did not even know what it meant. Homosexuality was a subject that nobody talked about or even hinted at. This was in 8th grade. So I went back home and looked up the meaning in a dictionary.
That was my introduction to sexuality and its variations. It was not just man and woman who could be ‘happy ever after’ like how I was conditioned to believe. I knew eunuchs existed. I had seen them dancing and roaming around in trains or on busy roads clapping their hands at male commuters and demanding money. The failure to comply meant that they would lift their skirts and flash. I was always curious about them. The media never had anything on them. They did not exist for them but I saw them everyday on my way to school, to play or to work.
So I researched and found they were intersex people, born with both sex organs. I was always intrigued by their physical features. They looked like men but had breasts and talked and behaved like women. They did not exist for the government where any job application required one to specify whether one was a male or a female. The in-betweens had no option to click. They could not get jobs. They were reduced to begging and dancing on the streets and entering prostitution. The media ignored them. And it annoyed me. They were people and isn’t the media supposed to give voice to the voiceless.
All through my time in India, in Mumbai and Delhi, I never came across anyone who was gay or lesbian. Maybe some of them were, but they were not out. I read all these reports about boys sodomizing other boys in school toilets and I read about this lone activist Ashok Rao Kavi who was fighting for gay rights in India.
Having sex with someone from one’s own sex is a punishable offence in India and maybe that’s one reason why people are afraid to come out of closets. As I became part of the media, I came to know many of these people. And I started to understand the complexities of queer representation in the media.
Fire was the film that brought the issue to the forefront. Made by a woman director considered very arty and a champion of parallel cinema, Deepa Mehta, the film is about two women married to two brothers, who indulge in lesbian sex because their husbands do not have time for them. The film disturbed me. Something was wrong.
And a few years later, I realized what was wrong with the film. It showed the women turn lesbian after they were shunned by their husbands. So, the film was not about women loving each other at all. It was a story of rejection and degradation of women who are unsatisfied and turn to each other to fulfill their sexual needs only after they are rejected by their male counterparts.
Then, as I was starting to comprehend media messages, came another film Girlfriend. The promos of the film had two girls making out and it was erotic enough to attract viewers. I went to watch the film, intrigued by the boldness of this director to touch a subject that is so forbidden. The film at best was outrageous. The lesbian character was portrayed as villainous who was trying to lay her hands on her straight roommate who was in a relationship. She was a dark character, trying to kill the other girl’s boyfriend in a fit of jealousy. In a way the film looked down upon lesbians as vamps and straight girls as victims and men as their saviors enforcing the stereotypes. The lesbian character was butch lesbian, while the straight one was a demure, pretty and innocent damsel in distress. The savior of course was a macho guy.
The film also was rejected by the public who were not ready for stark lesbian portrayals. Girlfriend was a mainstream commercial cinema. The actresses later apologized to have acted in a movie that had something to do with lesbians and said it was a fault and they respected the culture and would not do such films again.
When I came to United States for my master’s in journalism, I made a lot of gay friends. But I did not come across any lesbians or bisexuals. I took up the LGBT issues as my beat for my advanced reporting class in order to learn more about the community and the problems it was facing. My first story was on Vatican banning gay priests. I was shocked to see how even in America, sexuality was pre-defined. People did not have a choice and gay rights was an issue here too. Being gay is also viewed as being a pedophile by the Catholic church.
I am a straight ally and I am a member of various gay clubs on campus. A friend saw my name in one of the gay clubs on facebook and asked me why was I in Gay At SU, the gay group. This was interesting. It is judging and compartmentalizing people based on their preferences or views.
The media representations are also mostly stereotypical. Will & Grace is one show I am familiar with. The gay characters are almost always impeccably dressed with a fine taste in arts and music. They are effeminate and metrosexual males who spend too much time on their looks and have a lot of money. They are also the best friends for the female lead character.
But my friend Roger Batson was not at all like this. He shopped at Walmart, T.J. Maxx and did not frequent operas or went to theatres. He does not flutter his eyes when he sees an attractive guy. He is just like any other guy. But this is not what the media portrays.
Damon Romine of GLAD told me the media does this to create easy reference points for the audience. He said it is dangerous because when gay people do not see themselves reflected in the media, they think something is wrong and this delays their coming out process. Sometimes, it forces them to be in the closet all their lives.
In Indian films lately we are seeing more of gay characters but they are not fully developed characters. They are either there to provide a comic relief or are there to be the actress’ best friend. Another film that comes to my mind is Monster. Charlize Theron enacted a lesbian character but though the film deserves kudos for dealing with such a subject, the portrayal of the character was very stereotypical and it showed Theron as a butch lesbian.
And as per the discussion in class, there are no bisexuals or transgender characters on television. I agree. During the fall semester, I also had a chance to meet with Frances Fischer, a transgender woman. She was in the process of transitioning and lost her job. At 52, she was struggling to get a job and at the time I met her she was cleaning tables to earn a living and was on public assistance. As I sat with her in the food court at the mall, I saw several people look at us with interest. They were amused. Why can’t we treat people as humans and respect the choices they make in their lives regarding their sexuality?
Most gay organizations do not include transgender people. That leaves the transgender people in a bad situation. I thought the gay community will understand their pain and suffering since they are experiencing the same isolation and rejection. But they don’t.
Bisexuals are another set of people who are finding it difficult to explain to others that their sexual inclination toward both sexes is not acquired. It comes natural to them. I have many bisexual friends and over so many cups of coffee I have tried to understand them and feel their difficulties in hiding or selectively revealing to others their true selves lest they are misunderstood.
Such is the image that media presents that many people think that gays and lesbians are desperate and are terrified of associating with them. When I introduced one of my straight friends to my gay friend, he confessed he had always been scared of entering gay bars or hanging out with gay people because he thought they would hit on him.
That was my introduction to sexuality and its variations. It was not just man and woman who could be ‘happy ever after’ like how I was conditioned to believe. I knew eunuchs existed. I had seen them dancing and roaming around in trains or on busy roads clapping their hands at male commuters and demanding money. The failure to comply meant that they would lift their skirts and flash. I was always curious about them. The media never had anything on them. They did not exist for them but I saw them everyday on my way to school, to play or to work.
So I researched and found they were intersex people, born with both sex organs. I was always intrigued by their physical features. They looked like men but had breasts and talked and behaved like women. They did not exist for the government where any job application required one to specify whether one was a male or a female. The in-betweens had no option to click. They could not get jobs. They were reduced to begging and dancing on the streets and entering prostitution. The media ignored them. And it annoyed me. They were people and isn’t the media supposed to give voice to the voiceless.
All through my time in India, in Mumbai and Delhi, I never came across anyone who was gay or lesbian. Maybe some of them were, but they were not out. I read all these reports about boys sodomizing other boys in school toilets and I read about this lone activist Ashok Rao Kavi who was fighting for gay rights in India.
Having sex with someone from one’s own sex is a punishable offence in India and maybe that’s one reason why people are afraid to come out of closets. As I became part of the media, I came to know many of these people. And I started to understand the complexities of queer representation in the media.
Fire was the film that brought the issue to the forefront. Made by a woman director considered very arty and a champion of parallel cinema, Deepa Mehta, the film is about two women married to two brothers, who indulge in lesbian sex because their husbands do not have time for them. The film disturbed me. Something was wrong.
And a few years later, I realized what was wrong with the film. It showed the women turn lesbian after they were shunned by their husbands. So, the film was not about women loving each other at all. It was a story of rejection and degradation of women who are unsatisfied and turn to each other to fulfill their sexual needs only after they are rejected by their male counterparts.
Then, as I was starting to comprehend media messages, came another film Girlfriend. The promos of the film had two girls making out and it was erotic enough to attract viewers. I went to watch the film, intrigued by the boldness of this director to touch a subject that is so forbidden. The film at best was outrageous. The lesbian character was portrayed as villainous who was trying to lay her hands on her straight roommate who was in a relationship. She was a dark character, trying to kill the other girl’s boyfriend in a fit of jealousy. In a way the film looked down upon lesbians as vamps and straight girls as victims and men as their saviors enforcing the stereotypes. The lesbian character was butch lesbian, while the straight one was a demure, pretty and innocent damsel in distress. The savior of course was a macho guy.
The film also was rejected by the public who were not ready for stark lesbian portrayals. Girlfriend was a mainstream commercial cinema. The actresses later apologized to have acted in a movie that had something to do with lesbians and said it was a fault and they respected the culture and would not do such films again.
When I came to United States for my master’s in journalism, I made a lot of gay friends. But I did not come across any lesbians or bisexuals. I took up the LGBT issues as my beat for my advanced reporting class in order to learn more about the community and the problems it was facing. My first story was on Vatican banning gay priests. I was shocked to see how even in America, sexuality was pre-defined. People did not have a choice and gay rights was an issue here too. Being gay is also viewed as being a pedophile by the Catholic church.
I am a straight ally and I am a member of various gay clubs on campus. A friend saw my name in one of the gay clubs on facebook and asked me why was I in Gay At SU, the gay group. This was interesting. It is judging and compartmentalizing people based on their preferences or views.
The media representations are also mostly stereotypical. Will & Grace is one show I am familiar with. The gay characters are almost always impeccably dressed with a fine taste in arts and music. They are effeminate and metrosexual males who spend too much time on their looks and have a lot of money. They are also the best friends for the female lead character.
But my friend Roger Batson was not at all like this. He shopped at Walmart, T.J. Maxx and did not frequent operas or went to theatres. He does not flutter his eyes when he sees an attractive guy. He is just like any other guy. But this is not what the media portrays.
Damon Romine of GLAD told me the media does this to create easy reference points for the audience. He said it is dangerous because when gay people do not see themselves reflected in the media, they think something is wrong and this delays their coming out process. Sometimes, it forces them to be in the closet all their lives.
In Indian films lately we are seeing more of gay characters but they are not fully developed characters. They are either there to provide a comic relief or are there to be the actress’ best friend. Another film that comes to my mind is Monster. Charlize Theron enacted a lesbian character but though the film deserves kudos for dealing with such a subject, the portrayal of the character was very stereotypical and it showed Theron as a butch lesbian.
And as per the discussion in class, there are no bisexuals or transgender characters on television. I agree. During the fall semester, I also had a chance to meet with Frances Fischer, a transgender woman. She was in the process of transitioning and lost her job. At 52, she was struggling to get a job and at the time I met her she was cleaning tables to earn a living and was on public assistance. As I sat with her in the food court at the mall, I saw several people look at us with interest. They were amused. Why can’t we treat people as humans and respect the choices they make in their lives regarding their sexuality?
Most gay organizations do not include transgender people. That leaves the transgender people in a bad situation. I thought the gay community will understand their pain and suffering since they are experiencing the same isolation and rejection. But they don’t.
Bisexuals are another set of people who are finding it difficult to explain to others that their sexual inclination toward both sexes is not acquired. It comes natural to them. I have many bisexual friends and over so many cups of coffee I have tried to understand them and feel their difficulties in hiding or selectively revealing to others their true selves lest they are misunderstood.
Such is the image that media presents that many people think that gays and lesbians are desperate and are terrified of associating with them. When I introduced one of my straight friends to my gay friend, he confessed he had always been scared of entering gay bars or hanging out with gay people because he thought they would hit on him.
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