Bring on the cheerleaders
Phew! the country's honour has been saved by our good leaders, who are always on the alert against any act that ever so slightly soils our pristine reputation. They certainly do not want the people, who, at the very sight of a raised hemline turn into monsters. So, the cheerleaders have been told to get an extra cover and police voluteering to decide on obscenity levels!
The same logic applies in banning advertisements of liquor and cigarettes. So the guys and gals are shown to be getting high on plain soda water or the Red & White guy jumping off a cliff to save a damsel in distress with nary a trace of smoke, let alone fire.Whom are they trying to fool? the people or the nanny State that has brought things to such a pass.
For all the trouble taken to keep people away from such evils, does any of it work in actual practice? No is the answer. Otherwise, how do you explain the frequent incidents of misbehaviour with foreign tourists. When the government grandiously touts the "Atithi Devo" (seeing the guest as God) philosophy, the ground sitiaton is totally different. As soon as tourists land, they are fleeced by cabbies, harassed by hordes of beggers and sellers of trinkets and others. The general impression that all white skinned foreigners are persons of easy virtue continues.
Keeping with the tradition of prudery that would have put Victorians to shame, various state governments have decided against sex education in schools, leaving children to imbibe such knowledge from the usual "dubious" sources. The net result is the thinking that this particular aspect of life is something so bad that it has to be done surruptitiously all the while pretending to be paragons of virtue.
What is the message we are seeking to convey. That we are a nation of hypocrites, nothing less.
The same logic applies in banning advertisements of liquor and cigarettes. So the guys and gals are shown to be getting high on plain soda water or the Red & White guy jumping off a cliff to save a damsel in distress with nary a trace of smoke, let alone fire.Whom are they trying to fool? the people or the nanny State that has brought things to such a pass.
For all the trouble taken to keep people away from such evils, does any of it work in actual practice? No is the answer. Otherwise, how do you explain the frequent incidents of misbehaviour with foreign tourists. When the government grandiously touts the "Atithi Devo" (seeing the guest as God) philosophy, the ground sitiaton is totally different. As soon as tourists land, they are fleeced by cabbies, harassed by hordes of beggers and sellers of trinkets and others. The general impression that all white skinned foreigners are persons of easy virtue continues.
Keeping with the tradition of prudery that would have put Victorians to shame, various state governments have decided against sex education in schools, leaving children to imbibe such knowledge from the usual "dubious" sources. The net result is the thinking that this particular aspect of life is something so bad that it has to be done surruptitiously all the while pretending to be paragons of virtue.
What is the message we are seeking to convey. That we are a nation of hypocrites, nothing less.
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