BREAKING: Arundhati Roy arrested by fashion police!

After appearing at a public event a couple of days ago, noted writer and regular user of Dabur Amla Hair Oil, Arundhati Roy, was arrested in the evening today for crimes against fashion. She has been taken into stylist custody. Tomorrow morning, she will appear before a panel headed by Justice Tim Gunn which will decide on further action to be taken. Her sentence might include watching the movie The Devil Wears Prada everyday for the next year and a free lifetime subscription to Vogue magazine.

An insider who refused to publically give his name as he wasn’t appropriately dressed said that Ms. Roy has been repeatedly warned against committing such heinous offences like wearing a cocktail dress to a morning event and buying off the rack.

Noted designer Manish Malhotra termed her outfit at the public event as a ”seditious felony against couture”. “She acts as if the rules of fashion do not apply to her”, he continued.

Sources in the ministry of fashion told us that in a report submitted by LIFW agents assigned to spy on her it was revealed that she gets her hair done from the same barber as Jairam Ramesh.

Sagarika Ghose, CNN-IBN journalist and the second person ever to be given the title Nightingale of India, wondered on twitter “Why has Arundhati not yet understood that Jimmy Choo is an integral part of the modern Indian woman’s wardrobe?”

The death of romance on Indian television

 

The other day I was aimlessly teevee surfing, trying to watch something watchable on Indian teevee (yeah. my bad!), which I tend to do from time to time, being the eternal optimist I am. I didn't succeed in that, as usual, but I did realize something which gave me the sads.

A sort of epiphany, if I may say so.

They finally killed romance at it's last remaining place of residence.

Television.

During the early 90's, when everyone was still innocent (because the internet was not that widespread and the only way to learn about sex was to read one of the 200 printed copies of  a Shobha De book) and the only supercouple on teevee was Ram & Sita (they were like Bella & Edward from Twilight, except with less brooding and no sex), the leading protagonist from the epic Ramayana (it was just like Avatar, except instead of an American company, the good guys were fighting a really smart evil king. And the leader of the good guys was an actual real life AVATAR! In fact, he was probably the first Avatar ever!!).

So this ancient supercouple were the ideal representation of love on the small screen.  However, their love took an ugly turn (which was very Alec Baldwin/Kim Bassinger-esque) and Sita ended up visiting her aunt in the earth's core, forever. (That's how the used to break up in ancient times. None of the modern 'I hope we can be friends' crap. Once you were done, boy, were you fucking done!).

Apparently, melodrama was all the rage back then!

The next supercouple which caught the nation's eye was from a cartoon show. Even though the show was for little children, it caught the adults fancy. That was because it contained the cutest couple on Indian television ever, Bagheera & Baloo.

Yes, that's right.

Though they weren't a conventional couple, and their love was the love that dare not speak it's name, (homophobia was all the rage back then) those of us in the know nodded our head and played along.

On Sunday morning, whenever that really irritating song came on, the whole family sat together and saw Bagheera and Baloo bring up their adopted retarded human child, whose name was Mowgli. In fact, if it wasn’t for them, Mowgli would have grown up to be an animal!

They bickered, fought over all the little things like household expenditures and in-laws, however, just like every other teevee couple, they made up.

Awww, love, thy name is Bagheera & Baloo!

Then, in the aughts, came the supercouple to beat all the other supercouples.

The greatest one of them all.

Mihir and Tulsi.

Indian teevee’s Bragelina!

They had 1,000,0000,00000,0000000,0000000,000000 kids, of both the legitimate and the illegitimate variety, magically born without them ever “bumping uglies”. They stayed together through so many ups and downs, aided in their adventures by one lonely woman who was probably as old as the earth itself.

Both Mihir & Tulsi loved each other so much that they came back from the dead, a couple of times, just to be with each other again. In fact, both of them voluntarily kept changing their appearance so as to keep the romance alive!. Say what you will about them but, boy, that's called commitment.

Now, even thought those two are not on teevee anymore, sometimes, when the night sky is clear, one can see them floating in space, along with their favourite old woman, because their saga is endless, just like a Manmohan Singh speech .

That was the past.

And this is the present.

'I just want to grab once' is the new 'Honey, your eyes are so beautiful'

Just like everything else, the most unreal thing on the teevee, "Reality Television", has ruined romance!

All everyone wants to do in these shows is fuck each other & get famous! Nobody wants to do the hard work of developing an actual talent. Even if they want to sleep their way to the top, they should do it discreetly, like in they used to do in olden times!

I don't know about you, but I'd rather believe that some woman lived for a thousand years rather than some misogynist who looks like Himesh Reyshamia and Shakti Kapoor had a love-child will get two, intelligent woman to get "intimate" with him. Although, girlfriend, if you end up with that guy, you’re really not that intelligent!

There was a time when people actually cared for the pretention of romance. In fact, some families were so modern that they let both their children speak to each other before they arranged their marriage!

And from that we went to this?

What has the world come to? A person can't even cheat on his significant other. Isn't that what they are there for? Why can't they find out about each other’s ventures outside their relationship in twenty years, when the illegitimate child comes to take his share of the money, like other normal people?

This began when all of us started watching Ally McBeal and took relationship advise from the cast of F.R.I.E.N.D.S.! 

We took something so beautiful like forcibly living together with each other even though the love died long ago and all you’re doing now is keeping up appearances and we turned it into something so ugly! 

This is going to be our generation’s teevee legacy. A bunch of illiterate people shouting the f-word at each other, completely out of context.

We helped kill something which gave hope to millions of suppressed kids that maybe one day they might actually have a chance to be happy before they grew up and their cynicism took over.

For that, we need to hang our heads in shame.

Just like the old guy wearing a wig young woman in the scene below.

Huffington Post SLAMS brown people*

The Internet’s favourite do-rag, the Huffington Post, where the real housewives of Jim Carrey go to “educate” people on the dangers of getting their children vaccinated and actual writers are forced to sit in a slave shop under Arianna Huffington’s desk and write for free, encourages people to racially profile their fellow passengers while boarding a plane.

In an article published a couple of days ago, written by the wife of David “Axis of Evil” Frum, Danielle Crittenden. goes all Mike Huckabee and masks her ignorant bigotry as with “concern for her children”. Not surprising, because these days even David spends his time trying to unsuccessfully pass of as a reasonable person! 

In January and February, 2004, there was a flurry of terrorist threats against international flights between London and Paris and Washington; some flights were canceled; aircraft were grounded and searched; in one instance, F-16 fighter jets escorted a British Airways flight from Heathrow to Dulles.

In March, my husband and I took our three children on a holiday in Europe: our return flight, aboard Air France, connected through Paris' Charles de Gaulle airport. We had a three-hour layover before we could board our homebound jet to Washington-Dulles. After clearing international security and poking around the terminal for a bit, the five of us settled into benches in the empty departure lounge -- empty, that was, except for two suspicious-looking men in a bench opposite ours.

Let’s see what those suspicious men looked like:

I say suspicious because they matched almost every profile of a terrorist I'd ever read: Both looked to be about 25 or 26, of Arab descent, beards, dressed in the modern Atta traveling fashion of jeans and t-shirts. Neither had any carry-on bags for an eight-hour flight. One of the men was reading an Arabic newspaper while the other seemed twitchy -- he kept looking around, and repeatedly kept pulling out his documents from a small bag to check them over again.

So, apparently, dressing in jeans and t-shirts is now part of the terrorist garb. Why couldn't those Muslims be conspicuous and wear “Death to America” t-shirts, instead of dressing like normal, harmless white people?. Also, how dare they pretend to act like every other bored airline passenger and keep checking their documents? So what if a middle-aged white woman kept staring at them like they were terrorists? They should have simply sat there silently, and not act twitchy and roam around the lounge making fragile people shit their pants!

Gradually more passengers began filtering into the lounge as the flight departure grew closer. Then, promptly at three o'clock, the two men went over to a large window, fell to their knees and began elaborately praying to Mecca.

"That's it," I told him. "I'm not getting on this plane."

Elementary, my dear Watson! That’s a sure-fire tell-tale sign. Not only were those two wearing the latest terrorist chic, they were praying TO Mecca, instead of in the direction of Mecca, just like the Catholics pray TO the Vatican and the Jews pray TO Jerusalem!

But, hey, maybe talking to security can allay her fears?

Spoiler alert: It doesn’t!

There was a very French-looking security man: white bushy hair, a big white mustache, and a girth that suggested he enjoyed his duck confit and lunchtime Bordeaux as much as his other fellow citizens of the Republic.

Okay, now she has a problem with the French? Then, what the fuck were you doing in fucking France? If you really are so afraid of everybody, why step out of your house at all? And, seriously, being an American, the capital country of obesity, you’re going to snark on the girth of a Frenchman? Also, just because he’s fat, does that make him incapable of being a proper security guard? He has to check people’s luggage for shampoo , not run a half-marathon! I’m beginning to think this lady might have a problem with people in general!

He listened to my husband, nodded, glanced over at the two men, then came over to speak to me. I stepped away from the children, who were all preoccupied with their electronic playthings. I reported everything I'd watched and he listened gravely -- I could not tell whether he thought he was dealing with a hysterical mother or not.

"Madame, I can assure you that no aspect of security has been overlooked on this flight."

"Why are you so certain."

He smiled slightly. "Because I am privy to security measures that I cannot discuss with you. French security is not so -- ahh -- let me say it is different from American security. Let me repeat: this is a very safe flight."

Over his shoulder I watched the two men join the boarding queue: they looked actively jumpy by this point.

Yes, jumpy! That is so suspicious. Because terrorists are known to attract attention to themselves while boarding a target. This woman is so smart, my brain hurts!

My husband and I discussed it between us. He was prepared to go ahead but equally okay to cancel out of the flight if I was that nervous; I felt a little embarrassed by my fears. Then I looked at the bent line of the heads of my children, fighting imaginary enemies on their toys. Was I going to trust their fates to the assurances of an airline security guard?

"If we stayed, we could get a room at one of the airport hotels, take the train in to Paris for dinner, and return here tomorrow morning," I proposed. "That wouldn't be so bad --"

"No."

"The alternative," I continued, "would be for you to have me digging my nails into your forearm for eight hours..."

We waited for our bags to be removed from the plane. The children were delighted at this turn of events. They had never seen Paris

Bigot McGee is right! It’s all about the children. That was her only concern. This wasn’t about her at all. She just didn’t want to see any of those evil looking, jeans wearing, Mecca praying “terrorisors” to harm her children. So what if her children grow up to be brown people hating bigots too? Isn’t that what’s American conservatism is all about? Passing on your own deep-seated fear of the “others” to your children, as inheritance?

But, hey, as Racist Barbie will tell you, just because she looks at brown people in a funny way, she ain’t no racist!

Three years after the shoe-bombing incident, I experienced my own episode of terrorist profiling (and maybe that's what we should call it: not "racial" profiling but "terrorist" profiling, because the two are completely different. The latter does not arise out of irrational prejudice).

Yes, it’s not “racial” profiling if you don’t call it that. Just like if you are for “family values” & “traditional marriage” doesn’t mean you hate gay people and want them to remain second class citizens. You just want to protect your children. And it’s not that you think women have a right to make choices about their own bodies, you just love believe in the sanctity of life. I mean if God didn’t want that baby to be born, he wouldn’t have let that frat boy date rape you! It’s that simple, people! God probably has a plan for you. It might include you spending your after-life in “eternal damnation”, but hey, a plan’s a plan!

Why is that so hard to understand?

However, let’s find out what ugly fate was wrought upon all those people who were stupid enough not to say something.

The flight we had rejected landed without incident.

So that means that you’re not going to do that again right? I mean, once bitten, twice shy, right? Right?

Now, nearly seven years later, and in the wake of the Juan Williams incident, I ask myself: Would I make that same decision again?

Without question. And I hope I would still have the guts to report a troubling passenger to an airline clerk without fear that I might be branded racist.

Basically, what she’s trying to say is: I was wrong. But I’d do it again, because of terrorism!

 

* Post headline written in the style of Huffington Post articles!

[via Gawker]

India wins seat on UN security council; takes over the world!

The Indian government has been hard at work trying to convince the rest of the world to start giving a fuck about our opinion. It would been simpler to get a twitter account or write a free article for the Huffington Post and bait everybody into listening, but I guess we don’t do simple things, due to our impending superpower status.

Speaking of superpower status, guess what? We finally got a seat on the UN Security council! YAY! We numba one, bitches! Suck on that, Pakistan!

Uh, what?

After A gap of 19 years, India will once again be at the UN high table — the Security Council — as a non-permanent member.

As many as 187 countries in the 192-member UN General Assembly voted for India, the largest support received by any country for a non-permanent seat in the past five years. India has been on the UNSC six times in the past.

Huh? It’s just a non-permanent seat? And we’ve already held it six times before? You mean to say we’re doing it again with our own sloppy seconds? That’s simply preposterous!

But, hey, so many countries voted for us. That should count for something, innit?

To be elected to the Council, candidate countries need a two-thirds majority of ballots of Member States that are present and voting in the 192-member Assembly. The seats are allocated on the basis of geographical groupings.

Colombia, India and South Africa ran unopposed and were elected to represent their respective regions, having received 186 votes, 187 votes and 182 votes, respectively, in the first round of balloting.

Ahem, so what? We won, that’s what counts right? Now we can set the agenda, make them talk about real issues, show them who’s boss, right? RIGHT?

Following their election, South Africa, India, Colombia, Germany and Portugal will become non-veto holding members of the Council in January with the mandate to impose sanctions, as well as deploy peacekeeping forces around the world.

That’s it? All we get to do is write strongly worded letters and referee stupid civil wars? We don’t even get a measly ten percent discount at the UN gift shop? This is so disappointing! It’s like attending a Broadway musical choreographed by straight people! Or being a fan of the Kolkata Knight Riders! Or winning an all-expenses-paid vacation to New Jersey!

This is so unfair. We so deserve to be on the security council. We invented the zero, bhangra music and Anil Kapoor.

Isn’t that reason enough for everyone to ask us out and make us prom king?

 

Five new countries elected to two-year terms on UN Security Council [Joy Online]
187 of 192 backing it, India gets UNSC seat [Indian Express]
South Africans “Ecstatic” over Security Council Selection [VoA]