Sarcasm at public platforms should not be derogatory, it should entice a sense of interest among the listeners. A little bit sense of humour in conversations will trigger a sense of joy at workplaces and homes. It strengthens relationships but if exceeded the threshold, it destroys them.

In this era of technology with huge penetration of internet in the urban India, the creativity of netizens in expressing their sense of humour in the form of memes and trolls started bewildering me these days. The target of Social Media trolls range from the Prime Minister of a country to a normal citizen who genuinely expresses his/her opinion.

An empty vessel will not make any noise and neither a full vessel. The noise can be heard only if it is half filled. The same is applicable to our troll and meme creators who are aware of only little things and are mostly blinded to examine the entire picture. These hypocrites generate a lot of useless content in Social media and therefore contribute to false information that goes viral instantly.

Most of the memes and trolls go making fun of the actions and comments made by politicians, celebrities, sports persons and more pathetically even against a common man. The reasons for this kind of stupidity of meme creators are several, the significant among them is the state of mind like a half-filled vessel like mentioned above.

In today’s liberal world, we are blessed with the opportunity to show dissent against the authority and share our opinion anywhere with anyone. But this does not mean that you can share your insane senselessness with anyone. What worries us a lot is the same levels of stupidity which floats in the minds of the general netizens who ‘like’ them and ‘share’ them instantly.

Entire knowledge and thought process in the debate is going down the drain paying very high price.

What surprises and disheartens me is the content of the trolling videos made by Madras Central and Jump Cuts in Tamil and many other popular YouTube channels across all the languages. Why these morons are always making fun of others? The magnitude, the language, the wit and kind of insults they throw upon their troll subjects is out of bounds and strictly needs to be controlled.  Yes. I agree our politicians are bad and celebrities are always over acting and hog for limelight unceremoniously. But that does not mean that they do not deserve respect and solitude. The counters and punches against them should be thought provoking. But what actually happens is the entire knowledge and thought process in the debate is going down the drain paying very high price to concentrate on humour. And therefore, unfortunately wisdom never appears in the debate.

With great power games great responsibility. Two decades ago, without social media we were powerless to express our angst against our suppressors. Only cartoon sketches in newspapers and magazines were funnily drawn to express thanks, anger and protest against government. But every one of us is empowered today with social media tools and sadly we have become irresponsible.

Where is the truth going?

False, fake and half-baked information is very dangerous. An enemy who tells the truth is better than a friend who lies to us. All the platforms like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Whatsapp which we hop on to share, transfer and gain knowledge are doing more bad than good.

With gigabytes of information flooding the social media daily, it has become extremely difficult to know the truth. All the content is not sure to be from credible source and not everyone is an expert in all the fields. This leads us to consume everything and cultivate opinions and ideals towards and against specific people, region, religion and events. So the motto is ‘Consume and Confuse to make a Collateral Collapse’.

Donald Trump is alleged to have successfully employed the ‘fake’ strategy to become American President. In India, national parties and regional parties have their own IT wings not only to promote their ideology and candidates, but also spread false information against their opponents.  They are masters in doing the same. So, it is left to us to make some research before believing anything. Just refer websites of standard news sources like Reuters, Associated Press, The Hindu, BBC, The Guardian, Hindustan Times, Indian Express, India Today, Aljazeera, The New York Times, Huffington Post, RT, CCTV before taking a stance on an issue. These standard websites cater to different countries and have different editorial ideologies. Refer them to gain a perspective and become wise enough to comment and share about the nonsense in social media.(Avoid watching Indian news channels except Cartoon Network). Don’t believe and consume anything on Social media. It is too dangerous for the country. I am writing this in my laptop computer with computer mouse placed upon today’s paper with Sunday special article The unlikely social media heroes of Kashmir.

I presume Facebook and twitter to be nonsense and useless sites for information. Quora contains half-baked information but still I found it extremely productive when it comes to gain a perspective. And YouTube – The only videos which were highly productive for me so far are ‘How to tie a tie, how to make Biriyani, Sambar and vegetable poriyal, Comedy scenes of Vadivelu, Goundamani, Senthil and Bramhanandam, Coke Studio, Music Mojo by Kappa TV, Put chutney, Vidya Vox and several beautiful short films’.

It’s time to use our time productively and be vigilant of what and why we read/watch not only for us but for the country.

Images from Pixabay, CC0 Creative Commons license.