Column

I was recently told by a journalist, in no uncertain terms, that the reader is a complete moron. Are you? The strangest part is that he’s not the first journalist to say this. At times a newspaper’s entire editorial policy is built around this maxim… that if life were a village, you’d be the idiot. This thought process isn’t unique to newspapers; the advertising industry’s the same (“dumb down the ads, so the consumer gets it”). Earlier this year we carried an article on why Bollywood has never made a big budget science fiction film; every director we spoke to said this: “Science fiction? The public just don’t have the mental ability to grasp it.”

This is a global phenomenon, which in part is why the Internet has boomed like Fat Man on steroids. The Internet is governed by you and hence the wealth of information is infinite; if there are barriers they are there for your safety, and even those are up for debate.

Up in Copenhagen protesters were being harangued, charged and assaulted by a police force that chooses to repress informed, peaceful protest with brutality. That’s what police do from London and LA, to Mumbai and Beijing.

The ‘moron factor’ plays a big part, this time on the part of the politicians you voted into power. They too think that you’re a few cards short of a full deck and hence should never be allowed on the streets in any number greater than one.

I have never considered myself a journalist, much to my mentors’ delight. The reason for this is that I don’t really care enough to be one. Earthquakes, riots, death, crime and corruption…crap happens, that’s my take. I’m in the business of newspapers. I’m a salesman, nothing more, nothing less. I make pretty packages, I don’t hawk information or empathy, like I said…I don’t care.

But the world is changing. As my fellow columnist S Shiv Kumar wrote recently. The days of the professional photojournalist are numbered, with the advent of the citizen armed with a camera. The same goes for reporters, writers and sub-editors. The ‘buffoon’ has thrown down the gauntlet.

Over the next decade, staff numbers at newspapers will shrink dramatically, as an increasing number of readers begin to contribute to reportage, features, and photography.

Any journalist can write a sensational story, but very few can pen an informed one, and that’s where you, the ‘IQ-challenged’ come in. No matter how many times global, national and local institutions have battered you down, undermined your intelligence, you have got back on to the proverbial horse.

Copywriters, politicians, law-keepers, journalists will come and go, you, however, will remain in some form or the other. The real power of change lies with you; the power to fell the Goliaths of infamy has always lain in the palm of your hand.

In Palestine the protests continue, as they do in Tehran, and across the globe. And they speak with one voice; the message is: “We shall not be cowed, we shall not be bought, we shall not be swayed, and we shall not be preached to. We are the people, and we know what we want, and we demand excellence, not
mediocrity.”

The next decade is the decade of the consumer, be it of news, products, or information. Societal institutions are failing and there are the tremors of an intellectual revolution. To misquote Lieutenant Colonel William “Bill” Kilgore: “I love the smell of anarchy in the morning.”Can you smell it? I can, and it reeks of victory.