Reality Shows, Gladiator Style

 

In ancient Rome, events that took place in the Colosseum and other such amphitheaters were of general interest to the people. Among the most common were gladiator fights and leaving prisoners of war and slaves in front of hungry wild animals. People in the Colosseum cheered at the sight of men fighting men and animals tearing men to shreds.

Today, TV reality shows have become a great source of entertainment. Bigg Boss is a very successful show. In this show, a set of losers, ex-convicts, out-of-work-models and stars and other such also-rans live in a house together, under the full glare of multiple cameras, with no interaction with the outside world.  They shout, shriek, fight, romance, backbite and scheme, all of which provides much entertainment to viewers. People watch these programmes for the crass display of vulgarity and foul-mouthed behaviour, which is despised in family situations but accepted when it is on television.

In ancient Rome, gladiators volunteered to fight. If they did not live up to expectations, they face disgrace and shame. If successful, fame and fortune were theirs. The gladiator would be accepted in society as a free man.

On shows such as Bigg Boss, Sach ka Saamna and Temptation Island (the Indian version of this one has not been launched yet. Thank God!), volunteers have agreed to live under banks of cameras for hefty sums — and the ultimate prize of fame and fortune. In the process, many face disgrace and are sometimes rejected for their unacceptable behaviour. Sometimes, though, the disgraced gets them more attention and success than the winner of the show has reaped. Fame, whichever way it is achieved, can lead to new career opportunities for the star whom the world would have otherwise forgotten.

With the Roman gladiators, the loser’s life was in the hands of the spectators. When a gladiator was overpowered by his opponent, the loser would raise his hand accepting defeat. The winner would let go of him and appeal to the audience for a decision. If the spectators showed thumbs-up signs, it meant the losing gladiator should be killed. Thumbs-downs indicated that he should be pardoned.

In reality shows, the contestant’s fate is in the hands of the viewers, who vote an inmate out of the house every week, thus eventually selecting the winner. Meanwhile, a minuscule percentage of the audience has realised that such shows are an insult to one’s taste and mental faculties, besides being offensive. So they prefer to be old-fashioned and tune in to the news or a quiz show.

What is the reason for the continued success of reality shows, then? It is Man’s inherent appetite for voyeurism.

Every individual has a secret desire to know what’s happening in people’s homes, behind closed doors. We all want to know — Rukmini Rukmini, shaadi ke baad kya-kya hua… khidki mein se dekho zara? This peeping-tom habit was always clandestine but television has brought it out in the open. Such open acceptance of voyeurism, and that too being satiated for children even without their asking or realisation, is making children lose their childhood before time and making all of us seem like hungry, salivating hounds.  

When such shows are promoting a culture of exhibitionism, glorifying humiliation, then why not ban them?

Times have changed. We do not live in the times of the gladiators and we do not have Roman emperors who could act on a whim. We supposedly live in an age of free speech, emancipation, self-control and, of course, democracy. Can we exercise some control and use the finger for the right button — to change the channel?

Do not degrade yourself just because a set of also-rans have decided to sell themselves to an audience hungry for scandal.

You decide!

The above has been published in the Mumbai edition of Hindustan Times dt. 12/12/10.

http://epaper.hindustantimes.com/PUBLICATIONS/HT/HM/2010/12/12/ArticleHtmls/Speak-Easy-Reality-shows-gladiator-style-12122010004007.shtml?Mode=1

The crime of Julian Assange

According to Greek Mythology, Sisyphus was the King of Corinth, who had some heroic deeds to his credit, but was punished by the gods for the heroism.

Sisyphus was witness to one of the escapades of Zeus, the King of gods. Once he saw Zeus kidnap one of the river nymphs and when the river god came looking for his daughter, Sisyphus revealed the location where Zeus had taken her. Zeus was outraged at this impudence, and as a punishment sent Thanatos, the god of death, to take Sisyphus’s life. But Sisyphus was too smart and decided to cheat the god of death, so that no mortal would ever have to encounter death! He managed to chain the god of death, till the gods came to know about it and sent another god to get the release of Thanatos. After some more events, all the gods were upset with Sisyphus, at his audacity. His crime – first, he revealed the secrets of the King of gods, Zeus, and second, he tried to keep death away from mortals.

His punishment was that he would have to eternally push a big boulder up a cliff, till he managed to put it on top of the cliff. If he stopped, then the boulder would crush him, and if he reached the top, it would roll off on the other end, and he would have to start again this never-ending task.

Doesn’t this sound very familiar to a recent hero, who too is being punished for revealing secrets? Julian Asange.

Asange (Sisyphus?) too has committed the ‘crime’ of revealing the secrets of the Big Brother (Zeus?). As a punishment for revealing the secrets, Sweden (Thanatos?) has been let loose behind him to try him for a crime, which is hardly a crime. His other crime, he supports the freedom of press and speaks against censorship (death?). For this crime, he is being tried under a different crime (alleged sex crimes). Are Big Brother and its friends, going to put him on trials after trials, so that he does not come out of them, and does not try to do them more harm, by revealing more secrets? Zeus didn’t have as many secrets as the modern day governments have!

But then, this is no Greek Mythology and we are no more mere mortals. Shouldn’t we take up the cudgels for a fellow mortal who is revealing the secrets of another set of mortals, who are on the pedestal, thanks to us? If this is a debate of freedom of speech, vs. censorship, then let us have the debate, but not hang the whistleblower before trial. In today’s time, let us behave like men, not like ancient Greek gods.

On a lighter note, to quote somebody, if anybody needs to be tried, then it is the condom manufacturer for selling condoms that leak, not the head of WikiLeaks. Let WikiLeaks, continue to leak!!

Atlantis

A recent corporate honcho has built himself a modern-day citadel, christened, Atlantis. So what is with the name and where does it come from?

According to some writings of Plato, Greek philosopher, Atlantis was a mythical country in the middle of the modern day Atlantic Ocean. Atlantis comprised of intelligent people and was mineral rich country, of the size of a continent, which had it all – fame, wealth, and the wherewithal of a dream nation. They were supposed to be advanced in their agricultural processes, whereby, they had two harvests a year, as against one, in later times.

According to a myth, Poseidon, the God of Oceans, fell in love with a mortal, Cleito, who bore him sons (five sets of twins), and the eldest of them, Atlas, was the king of Atlantis. Atlantis rose in its stature till it followed the rules laid down by their ruling deity, Poseidon. But soon, the kings started living by their own rules and the success of the nation’s health had started to yield fruits of corruption. People were becoming greedy and corrupt by the day. All this angered the gods at Mount Olympus, headed by Zeus. Zeus and his gods decided to teach them a lesson, and sent in series of calamities, in the form of a volcanic eruption and huge tidal waves, to submerge the whole nation of Atlantis.

Atlantis is referred to as the forgotten civilisation and also stands for all things that began well, but was destined to be doomed, due to pride and corruption. This incident or the myth has led to many an expedition to find the remnants of the lost city, in the Atlantic, even today.

It is not known if Plato really believed in the myth or wove a tale as a lesson for the people, but it has a long lasting impression on people of Greece. Many scholars feel that Plato was painting an idea of an Ideal state and what happens when falls from grace due to slipping ideals.

With such a background of Atlantis, I wonder which aspect of Atlantis was behind the naming of a residence. I would think it must be the dream nation and its prosperity that it once stood for. What else?

Hanukkah

Hanukkah is a Jewish festival of lamps, celebrated for eight days and nights. It commemorates the miracle of oil, which is part of the Jewish lore.

The incident is supposed to have taken place around 165 BCE, a place near Jerusalem, which was taken over by the Syrians, under Alexander the Great. Accordingly all places of worship were converted to Greek temples. During once such incident, a Jewish temple was converted to a temple of Zeus, and to hurt the Jewish sentiments, pigs were sacrificed at the temple, which was a sacrilege for the Jews.

This continued till one day, a Jewish High Priest, by the name of Mattathias, and his five sons decided to revolt against the Greeks. They did not rest till they managed to get back the control and drive out the Syrian-Greeks. As a part of the ritual cleansing of the Jewish temple in Jerusalem, they decided to burn the ritual oil at the Temple for eight days. But they found that they had stock of oil for only one day. They nevertheless went ahead and started the ritual only to find that the small quantity of the oil, miraculously burnt for eight days. Since then Hanukkah is being celebrated to mark this miracle and the regaining of the Jewish temple.

During this festival, the traditional Hanukkiyah which is a candelabrum with eight candleholders in a row, with the ninth one being slightly elevated, is lit. The Hanukkiyah is lit for eight days, one on the first day, two on the second, till all eight are lit on the eighth day. As a part of the celebration, the children play the dreidel, which is a four-sided spinning top with Hebrew letters on each side. Children usually play the dreidel for chocolates, candies or just about anything.

Hanukkah is an important festival of the Jews and coming close to Christmas holidays, its importance is all the more great. However, there is no significance of the fact that Hanukkah is so close to Christmas, and it is purely coincidental. Hanukkah in Hebrew means ‘dedication’, which is a reminder to people that the festival is for the re-dedication of the Jewish temple after taking it back from the Syrian-Greeks.

Gods of Love

Greek mythology has Eros and sometimes better known as Cupid as god of Love. Eros is a handsome man (the word "erotic", meaning sexual love, comes from his name), who is the son of Aphrodite, who had fallen in love with Psyche. However, it is as Cupid that he is better known. Cupid is a small winged child, who is both very good looking and extremely mischievous, with a penchant for shooting love arrows blindly (thus giving the phrase – love is blind). The ‘victim’ of his arrows is supposed to fall in love with the very person they see after being hit by the arrows. Cupid is sometimes shown riding a dolphin.

Hindu mythology has Kamdev as the god of love, and he too is handsome, moves around with bow made of sugarcane, strung with a line of bees and his arrows are flower-tipped with desire. His wife is Rati (passion) and together they create love, desire and passion. Kamdev’s is shown riding a parrot. Kamdev is supposed to have been born from Lord Brahma’s heart and his main supporter is Vasanta (Lord of Springs).

According to a myth, Lord Shiva was engrossed in deep meditation after the death of Sati and a mighty asura needed to be killed by Shiva’s offspring. Shiva needed to be disturbed from his meditation to even look at Parvati. All the gods requested Kamdev to wake him up by shooting his desire-filled darts. Kamdev knew the risk on hand, but complied with the request. When Shiva was disturbed, he was angry and when he found out the god responsible for this, he opened his third eye, and reduced Kamdev to ashes. But by then Shiva was very agitated and was being overcome with desire and love for Parvati, whom he had seen on opening his eyes. Later, on seeing the sad state of Rati who could not come to terms with the outcome of such a noble act by her husband, Shiva agreed to restore Kamdev, but only in spirit, which implied that Kamdev did not represent only physical love, but also true love and affection. Thus Kamdev is also known as Ananga, the bodiless! His other names are Madan (one who intoxicates with love) and Manmatha (one who agitates the mind with love)

We can see that both Cupid/Eros and Kamdev have similarities. Besides being handsome and evoking love by shooting arrows, they too have their own love stories. Eros with Psyche and Kamdev with Rati. Overtime, the love they evoke has gone through a metamorphosis in its implications, but the original response of their arrows continue to be carnal love, as we see in the case of Eros himself and Lord Shiva and Parvati. Mythology has never looked down on carnal love; rather there are numerous instances of such love in all mythologies. However, with the rise of man establishing moral standards, such examples were given a coating of philosophical interpretation.