Salman Khan 'raped woman' comment: What we learned about parenting, Bollywood and the media

Bollywood’s biggest star, the man who sets off a thousand editorials with every comment he makes, should really learn to zip it because every time he opens his mouth, he firmly puts his foot in it, forcing his old father and half-a-dozen Bollywood denizens to make excuses for the 50-year-old baby.

His speak-(or tweet)-before-you-think approach has often landed him in trouble but he doesn’t seem to learn. He was at it again recently when he described his strenuous workout regime for Sultan as being so traumatic that he felt like a ‘raped woman’.

Even for an actor not really known for his intellectual capacity or articulation, this was undoubtedly a stupid thing to say. But then we’ve given Salman Khan a longer rope than most people. We continually let him off the hook because he’s apparently a middle-aged baby who is neither capable of being held accountable for his actions nor has the ability to think before he speaks.

Perhaps he took too many hits in the head while training but that still doesn’t excuse what he said. What he said, however, did give us an interesting glimpse into the behaviour of others as we experienced the knock-on effect of Bhai’s pearls of wisdom.

Parenting is the worst job in the world

My father once told me that having kids is like watching little pieces of your heart run around and, yet, parenting is a very thankless job. You raise your child, put them out in the world, see them fight their own battles and try to protect them no matter what the world says about them. For Salim Khan, it seems like a battle that will continue to the grave as he has to step out time and again to make excuses for his son.

Forced to apologise for Salman’s Yakub Memon tweets and then defend his son’s dubious appointment as Rio’s Goodwill Ambassador, the Khan patriarch was at it again defending Salman’s comments: “"Undoubtedly what Salman said is wrong, the simili (sic), example and the context. The intention was not wrong. Nevertheless, I apologise on behalf of his family, his fans & friends. Forgiveness is to pardon the unpardonable or it is no virtue at all. To err is human, to forgive divine. Today on Intl Yoga Day, let’s not run our shops on this mistake."

By this time Salim Khan must have mastered the art of making excuses for his son. Here's what son Arbaaz said: “It was just the kind of (statement) where we compare things...I worked like a donkey, so now people will say you used the word donkey so some animal activist will come after you. Sometimes you say something out of context, your intention is not wrong but if you de-sensitise it and become over sensitive about it then you can create an issue over anything." 

Bollywood can come up with the most cringe-worthy excuses

Just recently, Bollywood was quick to slam Tanmay Bhatt for his Snapchat video on Lata Mangeshkar and Sachin Tendulkar. But when it came to Salman Khan's remarks, there was an eerie silence, as everyone except Anurag Kashyap, Sona Mohapatra and Renuka Shahane, stayed away from saying anything. As we grow older, we realise just how terrible the people we admired as children are as people.

One of Salman's defenders would make any political chamcha look respectable by comparison. Subhash Ghai defended Salman by saying he was a child who held women in high regard. Ghai blamed "disgusting translation by someone" and Salman's ‘poor English’ for the controversy.

He told ANI: “He is a child & 1 thing I know for sure is that he has high regards & respect for women. He (Salman Khan) only spoke about human agony he went through, the deepest human agony is when a woman is raped, it was a metaphor. It is insensitive and disgusting translation by someone.  He just said one thing that it is a human agony he went through. The deepest human agony is when a woman is raped. He was talking about a metaphor. He is just a child and I know he respects women like anything."

Sadly, we all heard the audio and nothing seems to be lost in translation here.

Even Pooja Bedi tried with a bizarre "if I say I feel fat as an elephant will Peta file a case?" and agreed it wasn’t the best simili (sic). The only thing we can agree on is that no one in Bollywood knows how to spell the world simile properly.

The media needs to take its share of the blame

It was ironic to see every news channel worth its salt spend the better part of prime-time discussing these remarks when you consider the fact that, as an industry, we helped create Salman Khan the superstar, helped ‘Being Human’ grow, set the PR in place and now we spend our resources outraging about Salman Khan’s remarks, which, while despicable, certainly shouldn’t be getting more coverage than real rapes and other issues that the nation faces.

We seem to have become an industry that depends perennially on anger, as we jump from one outrage to another. That we should spend so much of our resources on things a person said is preposterous when you consider the harsh conditions many of our countrymen live in. The fact that we appear angrier about something someone said rather than real instances of rape is something to be ashamed of. Stats claim that 24,923 rape cases were reported in 2012 in India, of which a shocking 24,470 cases (98%) were committed by someone known to the victim.

But focussing on measures to reduce rape or strengthening laws against the accused is something we leave to a handful of activists, and while those things might not garner as much TRP as demanding Salman Khan be dragged to the National Commission for Women (NCW), there has to come a time when we decide how far are going to let TRPs, circulation figures and online hits decide what we should cover as news.

Despicable as Salman's comments are, should we let them receive round-the-clock coverage rather than arguably more important stories that impact more people's lives?