THE NATIONAL LOSS OF COLLECTIVE SHIT

I had vowed never to write about the blog again. Actually, I promised myself I’d not write for a while because for the past week I forgot the one key ingredient that makes the absolute pot of unpredictability and randomness that is me-- laughter.

It was just too freaky a coincidence that I was in fact in the capital when the blogpost was shared about a gazillion times on facebook and all hell broke loose. I watched as I was simultaneously lauded and derided for a piece of writing that just wanted to be. ‘Broken Morning’ ,the blog that was meant to be my labour of love became an avenue for a phenomenon that I had never been witness or victim to before—trolling.

Now incase you haven’t noticed, I refuse to call myself The Madrasan anymore, as unlike your ‘Neha, Priya’ type generic names, I have a beautiful, well thought of name which the folks chose in the hope that I will live up to my rich musical lineage. The name is Shahana, also the name of an Indian Classical music Raga, was composed by the noted scholar Amir Khusrau, who some idiot troller on the blog called a ‘Delhi Boy’. Wow man, I could well imagine the regal 11^th century Sufi poet and musician in ripped jeans, a shaved chest ,revealing a locket that said ‘Jatts Do It’.

Now the number of troller aunties and uncles have run into thousands over the week. My closest friends –Biscuit, Kunzi, Pinky darling and Tanaz (mentioned in an earlier post) have over the last week been tracking responses, reactions and the general loss of any sense in the youth of the nation whatsoever. My trollers in general can be categorized into a few sections which are as follows:

THE ARTY FARTYS: Now this is the kind of troller who has his/her manners all intact but will begin every single sentence with “As a student of sociology/ anthropology/ social-anthropology/ political science/ whatever else DU teaches, I firmly believe”. They will quote stuff that a non Chomsky reader will interpret as !@#$%^& . Despite being repeatedly ignored, they WILL continue to crumple their cotton Fab India rip off sarees over their shoulders , they WILL continue to darken their kajal and they will continue to use words like what-the-fuck-are-you-talking-about-ism. One such gem I received was------

“The comments about broken English also betray some ignorance about the class structure and our education system which might be at fault rather than some innate inferior intellectual capacity”

All this coz I think saying ‘explain me’ is blasphemy.

THE AASHIQUE : This category has been good to me. From offering me a bottle of Single Malt to taking me to an Adele concert, these men have declared and promised me love of infinite possibilities. And I thank you boys for all the attention. Thanks to you , ‘mujhe badi feel aa gayee”. But among the stream of love songs, poems and sonnets, this one takes it:

“I WILL EAT ANY NUMBER OF COCONUTS FOR YOU. I WILL LIVE SHIRTLESS BEFORE THE GURUVAYOORAPPAN TEMPLE AND BABY I’LL EVEN PERFORM KALARIPAYATTU IN BED—JUST MARRY ME”

Now ladies and gentlemen, THIS is what I call a proposal. The Maa of course found it very disturbing that I would find martial arts in the bedroom the least bit appealing. I had to tell her very lucidly that this is as Mallu as I could get and that this man has some real potential and unlike most Indian women who live in sexual denial, I would be one who could proudly proclaim some ‘resounding’ success in arguably the most important department of a young relationship. Who needs men after that anyway?

MR.GUTTERMOUTH:

Now not only does he have a filthy mind, but his English sounds like he picked out words from dictionary .com, blindfolded. With sentence construction abilities that would put George Orwell and Toni Morrison to shame, this gentleman also has no clue as where he is going with himself or his long line of expletives. He has absolutely no qualms about describing in intricate detail what he would do to my body parts if he ever laid his grubby Delhi paws on me. So since Biscuit has been chief moderator since the open letter, all she does is delete.

And by delete I mean, earlier she’d delete just the obscene stuff that the Guttermouth put up, but then she just started deleting anything and everything coz she thought the blog did not look pretty with expressions such as “Shit happens, bitch barks and you are bitch, now I dare you, reply me. Also you are not having good looks so no one is looking you and your ‘BF’ must have slapped you to hilt because of your nonsense talks”.

Poetry no?

Wonder what would transpire, inspire, respire and fling the shit higher if the Arty Fartys and Guttermouth were locked in the JNU library together?

RACIST SHAADI .COM

Now the one aspect that makes this blog so very unique is the fact that yours truly was so oblivious to the fact that it could be moderated. The bad part is that the comments went on endlessly and I hadn’t read beyond number 15 because I was too busy handling death threats, it takes time man. BUT the great part is that when I came back from Delhi I could sit back with a glass of Red and go through every single one and laugh with the gharwaalas. Which brings me to the single most intriguing part of the blog, which was the fact that it had turned into a full -fledged Delhi mating ground. I would just like to inform The Beatles at this point that if they want to know-- “All the lonely people, where do they all come from?” Well, Harrison, McCartney, Starr and Lennon, I request you to please log on to raagshahana.blogspot.com and that’s where you’ll find them. Every single lonely, frustrated, jobless, nymphomaniac is right here. Don’t believe me? Let me enlighten you with an illustration from the comments section:

Fendi Wendy Khan market Delhi chick: Eh ya! This Shahana is such a total bitch na? I mean just look at her. Such a racist and how the hell can she call our men jerks ya?

Teri Maa di Behen di Delhi boy: Haan yaar, kitni kameeni hai na? What she is thinking she is hain? No boy will ever propose her, theek hai na?!?

Fendi Wendy Khan market Delhi chick: Yeah man, like totally. Bitch!

Teri Maa di Behen di Delhi boy: Are you from Delhi only?

Fendi Wendy Khan market Delhi chick: Yeah very much. True blue Delhi-ite <3

Teri Maa di Behen di Delhi boy: So you want to catch a drink sometime? Btw, I love your name!

So there you have it. Dates being fixed over a rant blog. Who’d have thunk?

There have been others of course. The ones who took full advantage of the situation and still do by posting opinions. The opinions being the links to their own blogs. Or even the IIT-IIM verbal brawl that broke out in the middle of the day where one techie told another techie to shove a ‘ motherboard up his CPU’ . Kunzi tried to intervene by screaming ‘I am gujju, I am gujju ” randomly and he of course got shot down coz you don’t mess with Punjabi techies coz they’re not just brash but can also do math.

So all in all it’s been an active and thoroughly entertaining week and I have been just appalled to see how people lost their nuts so completely over something so baseless and inane. Does the flak and lambasting mean I shall never rant again? Does it mean that I will start writing solely for my followers and not for myself? Does this mean that I will buckle and forget why I started ‘Broken Morning’ in the first place?

YOU WISH BABY.