Category Archives: Op-Ed

Can Bollywood Go Mainstream?

Churning out more than a thousand films annually, Bollywood is the largest film producer in the world. Bollywood films, which come in at about 3% the cost of production of Hollywood films, incorporate multiple genres and spectacles of all kinds: flamboyant costumes, elaborate musicals and dramatic dialogues. Bollywood dares to explore the uncharted territories that are taboo in Indian culture: homosexuality, extramarital affairs, IVF treatment, and more. These films communicate the unspoken truths of society. The question is, can Bollywood successfully transition from capturing the Indian audience to going mainstream?

On a gloomy January afternoon in Boston, I found myself bawling my eyes out at my favourite Bollywood movie of all time: Kal Ho Naa Ho. Made in 2003, this 3-hour-plus spectacle transports me seamlessly to the living room of my childhood, where I am huddled with my grandparents. A genre of its own, Bollywood has the ability to teleport you to the heart of Indian culture, to really remind you of home.

Bollywood and I have a complicated relationship. Films are extravagant, commercial and ludicrous all at once; an anathema to the contemporary Western standards of aesthetics. I have my moments questioning Bollywood’s depiction of life. Like most others, I live by more subtle emotions. So imagine my discomfort  at this melodramatic attempt at a larger-than-life production. Yet, there I was, fully assimilated into this film about a girl falling in love with her secretly ill next-door-neighbor who hovers over the family like a guardian angel. In rollicking dance numbers, they break into song as they redecorate their family-owned café on the streets of New York. Three hours later, I gathered myself together, my cheeks stained with tears.

Is it realistic for the lead actor to run along the centre painted line of street without getting hit by a car? Definitely not. Is it reasonable to believe that with every sad conversation, the clouds can no longer withhold the rain? Perhaps not. Is a coordinated dance at a nightclub a possibility? Most likely not. Yet despite the inaccuracies and unrealistic portrayals, Kal Ho Naa No (like many others), is an anthem to the average Indian. Indians don’t just accept the extravaganza, they embrace it and live vicariously through it. Anyone born within the decade likely knows its dialogues by heart, and definitely grooves to its super hit number, “It’s time to DISCO.”

Bollywood is aligning itself to meet the demands of a new world with an explosion on over-the-top (OTT) platforms such as Netflix and Amazon Prime. It is doing what it always did: animating the faults and frictions that torment our world, but targeting a much wider audience. Recently focusing on numerous short films and series, it is attempting to capitalise on the shortened attention span of the average viewer. Cinematic demand has transitioned from emotional appeal to intellectual engagement. In the last decade, the number of films with a strong social message has significantly increased. Films that were first used to escape reality are now attempting to address it

Critics argue that the essence of Bollywood lies in its extravagance. These musicals have shaped the dreams and aspirations of several generations. Of these critics, I ask, is that to say that Bollywood’s singular aim was to be a cultural export? In the past, did these films not have an intrinsic message?  Beneath the veil of music and melodrama, there was always a reality that resonated with every Indian. It was present, stretching your mind, prodding at your heart, stinging your eyes. Only now, it is more to-the-point, following the evolution of most successful entertainment channels in the 21st century.

That afternoon, as I cried my heart out to Kal Ho Naa Ho in my dorm room, I realised the true power of Bollywood. Loved as a commercial work of art by over 1.4 billion people, its penetration is about to increase exponentially. There is so much more to cinema than Western Superhero productions and French Mademoiselle movies, and the rise of Bollywood into mainstream media is likely to prove just that. Seen as unrealistic and extravagant outside its native culture, Bollywood is strong enough to survive in the “big league” merely by tweaking itself  to cater to a wider audience. Indian Cinema is no longer limited by national borders and language barriers: it is on its way to sweep the world off its feet. All it needs to do is take that leap of faith.

What’s going to happen to Art Museums after COVID?

 There is something calming about wandering the halls of a museum. It’s an event, a ritual, a source of cultural and intellectual stimulation. You know, the good kind of stimulation. The one that’s not spending 20 hours on Netflix, or decorating your island on Animal Crossing. It’s a multi-sensory experience: a melange of visuals, sounds and smells. In light of the recent health crisis, all of these in-person experiences have been cancelled, and moved online to ensure that art remains available to everyone. Obligated to ensure that “six feet apart” are kept between customers and staff, and hearts heavy with anxiety, administrations have been forced to adapt the ritual of a museum visit to ensure its survival. The question is, for how long? Long enough to render this online experience the new normal, and museum-going a hobby of the past? 

With the second week of March 2020 came numerous announcements of bans on large social gatherings across the world. When the call to adaptation was made, institutions were forced into a quick response. As universities and schools were closing down to eliminate the close social contact involved in their operation, museums and art institutes did the same. Obviously, evacuating a museum and closing its gates is a far less complicated process than kicking out thousands of students, staff and faculty. However, making the transition to online teaching is far less complicated than re-creating a museum experience on a two-dimensional screen. Texts can be reproduced mechanically with no loss of information, but artworks can’t. Of course, they can be captured in great detail and virtually reproduced; much discourse on museum digitization has captured social groups in the art world already, holding a long “pro’s”  list for its case. Thanks to technology,  all art works regardless of their medium can adorn the websites of their respective institutions. Still, something is off. 

 The Met, the Louvre and all the Guggenheims closed their doors effective immediately. The financial losses from this pandemic will be felt far into the future. With no visitors and thus, no income, huge deficits are already looming over cultural institutions. Once the doors open again, whenever that is, visitors will be far fewer — and certainly not foreign— for a while. Some institutions are luckier than others, enjoying large endowments and deep-pocketed trustees that could, if necessary, alleviate some financial stress. To remain relevant and not drop off visitors maps, museums have had to come up with ways to stay engaged with their communities. They moved online, but recreating an artwork or artefact digitally is not a new practice. The British museum has always had pictures of the looted Elgin Marbles and the Met has always pictures of the (also quite possibly looted) Blue Qur’an.

And although this enhanced approach to engaging with a museum seems to be solving many of our newfound problems, the issue of accessibility still remains. Besides basic ableism accessibility issues often overlooked, elitism also poses a threat to accessibility in museums. And that was definitely carried along in the digital version of museums. The social groups that have been historically excluded from the museum’s context now have a chance to engage with them with no one bothering them. That is, if they have a device. And an internet connection with that device. Oh, and time to do so while managing their lives, and quite possibly that of a few others, while in quarantine. Unfortunately, as accessible things are on the internet, all claims of accessibility are still being made on numerous assumptions about the audiences. 

Visuals in museum and other cultural institution sites are more than a concentrated cluster of images. They are images with a title, a text and a backstory. They’re carefully placed, following a particular order that is  aesthetically pleasing and follows some sort of progression. This progression, however, does not allow for traipsing back and forth from one wall to the other, letting your gaze wander in no particular direction. A piece beckoning to you like the mesmerizing light of an anglerfish, cannot be translated into a series of zeros and ones. The feeling of being, in the context of a cultural institution cannot be digitized, converted into a pdf or a podcast. When you’re in a museum, you’re not just looking at art. You are engaging in a collective ritual. 

 Truth be told, much more is available online now, meaning that it is also much more available. Going to the National Gallery in Edinburgh can be done from one’s couch, and viewing David in Firenze from the kitchen counter. The talks and workshops that many worked hard to plan and prepare are still happening, honoring the hard work that has gone into them. Audiences can still access and engage with cultural institutions, deriving a sense of normalcy and reassurance in these times of extreme uncertainty. The museum ritual endures, signaling that art will continue being produced and neurological connections will continue being made. The preferred context of occurrence might not be back for a while, but it will remain the optimal context.

While it is a great opportunity and a massive privilege to be able to view extraordinary pieces of work from institutions all around the globe at a time of extreme boredom and lack of stimulation, it’s just not the same as experiencing it in person. It’s not only art aficionados and Art History majors that know and firmly believe that. Going to the museum has been the perfect date, family outing or solo excursion. Viewing artworks online or taking virtual museum tours will have to do for now, but they’re nowhere near the real deal. 

Quarantine 15

Hand sanitizer, N95 masks, and ventilators. News coverage and social media-driven discussions about coronavirus focus on what we are lacking in the fight against COVID-19. In popular discourse, memes and Instagram stories have added another item to the list: self-control. Our apparent inability to socially distance ourselves from our refrigerators is causing Americans to sound the alarm against “Quarantine 15,” the idea that the average person will gain weight from stress-eating, boredom, and gym closures induced by the coronavirus. Why is it that in the midst of a global pandemic, we remain obsessed with how we look and what we weigh, especially when our appearance matters less than ever? 

Mandatory shelter-in-place orders mean American society is more sedentary than ever before. For the majority of us, the most steps we get a day are from moving from bed to couch, couch to fridge, with an occasional walk of the dog outside. With gyms, parks, and hiking trails closed, there are few options left to move around and be active. Yet, gaining a little weight during quarantine has quickly become a cruel joke –both something to simultaneously laugh at and fear– with some saying the “Quarantine 15” is just as worrisome as coronavirus. The cultural messaging behind this idea, spread by memes and humorous Internet comments, is that bodies who deviate from the Barbie-sized norm are somehow shameful.

If you have the privilege of a full fridge and are able to stay at home, the Quarantine 15 folks tell us, coronavirus is a lesser evil than imminent weight gain. Given the global pandemic, this obsession with weight and appearance is unseemly, to say the least. Healthcare workers aren’t worrying about whether or not to eat another slice of homemade banana bread; they are struggling to find pauses in their day to get a sip of water or use the bathroom. Households dealing with food insecurity aren’t concerned whether their pre-pandemic jeans still fit but instead are fighting to put food on the table. Those who wrestle with disordered eating are having their worst fears turn into the butt of a joke, all while trying not to fall into unhealthy coping mechanisms caused by this disruptive change in routine. In depicting weight gain as the enemy, “Quarantine 15” minimizes the challenges faced by all of these individuals.

With change dominating our daily lives during this pandemic, watching what we eat may represent a way to exercise some control in our lives. But in a time of crisis, shaming and making fun of those who lack this “self-control” reveals the darkly destructive American obsession with body image. Diet culture and ideas of thinness are so deeply ingrained in our cultural mindset that even in the midst of self-isolation and social distancing, we are measuring our self-worth based on how we look. As we’ve seen, coronavirus doesn’t care about numbers on a scale; weighing 110, 235, or 312 pounds has no effect on whether you fall victim to the virus. How we look and the number on a scale should be the last thing on our minds with the hyper-contagious, potentially fatal virus knocking on our doors. Our culture’s fixation on weight gain and loss before monumental events, from the dreaded “Freshman 15” to pre-wedding diets, takes its most ridiculous form in “Quarantine 15”. This pandemic calls for some perspective on body image: life changes, so does our body weight. 

What fatphobic “Quarantine 15” memes miss is that in times of crisis and social isolation, food can be a great source of joy. Food is not the enemy; it can be the vehicle of love. Cooking, baking, and bartending represent important chances to connect with others. Through sharing recipes, figuring out what a bread-starter is, and bingeing on Bon Appétit videos, you experience a sense of fellowship related to eating. The simple enjoyment of food and sharing it with people you love should not be understated or obscured in the panic of “Quarantine 15”. You don’t need to keep six feet away from your fridge, pandemic or not. 

The Kids are Not Alright: Fox eyes and Digital Race-fishing

In between videos of 15-second dances and POV’s, a disturbing beauty trend has emerged on TikTok: “fox eyes.” For those blissfully unaware, “fox eyes” refers to a specific eye shape and makeup style: slightly upturned, almond eyes, usually accented by a brown smoky liner and a straight brow. The blueprint is, of course, Bella Hadid, Kendall Jenner, or any of the other exoticized white models du jour. Ever the innovators, TikTok teens have taken to shaving off the ends of their brows to achieve the look, while others pull their eyes back with their hands, or, more extremely, pull hair back from the temples to pull their skin (and eyes) into a new shape. These gestures in particular are troubling, as they recall racist gestures made toward East Asian people, as many Asian TikTokkers have pointed out. They rightly call the trend out for taking a feature of racist bullying and turning it into a momentary beauty ideal. Most importantly, one can’t fulfill this ideal by naturally having the features, but by manipulating the face to achieve a look typically associated with another race. 

Fox eyes are hardly the only index of this. The rising trend of white social media stars getting fake tans and appropriative Black hairstyles has been dubbed “blackfishing,” a play on “catfishing,” as influencers attempt to appear Black, or “biracial”, without being subject to the consequences of anti-Blackness and racism. Critics like Lauren Michele Jackson have written at length about the semi-misnomer of “blackfishing” — the perpetrators don’t actually want to be Black, they want the particular clout and financial gain of embodying Black aesthetics in a non-Black body à la Kardashian. This is the crux of these trends: they are about achieving a suggestion of ethnic ambiguity that doesn’t stray too far from whiteness.

Given that the very foundation of beauty ideals in the West is predicated upon racism, these trends come as no surprise. On the surface, the shift from defining “classic beauty” around white European features to this new composite of various non-White features might seem like progress, but it is actually profoundly insidious. To have the intended impact, these features must be expressed on a white or white-adjacent person — “fox eyes” is not about seeing Asian people as beautiful, it’s about seeing a feature cut from the racialized person and pasted upon a white person, as beautiful. It is appropriation, not appreciation. It’s also dehumanization.

This slide towards an ethnically ambiguous beauty ideal is indicative of eugenicist  racial-mixing thought, and recalls that infamous National Geographic photo story. If mixed people are construed as more beautiful (and the mix in question is nearly always one that includes whiteness or proximity to it), it is the literal breeding out of certain racialized traits and the fetishization of others that makes them so. Now, we are seeing this idea taken even further as white people scramble to fulfill this pseudo-mixed-race ideal. 

The online world enables this to an alarming degree. Trends take off and are thoughtlessly imitated by thousands of people (in the case of fox eyes, many of them teenagers). Trends change faster than one can keep up, moving the goalposts of beauty at lightning speed, seemingly always toward still being resolutely racist but with more steps involved to feign political “wokeness” (a word that’s similarly been digitized and appropriated, which feels fitting). Stripped of the idea of being a “TikTok makeup technique” or “Instagram modeling pose,” the fox eyes trend bears a striking resemblance to old Hollywood yellowface, but there is something about both the internet and the perceived frivolity or inconsequentiality of beauty that has allowed many of these trends to go unchecked. 

We understand beauty trends, especially those popularized among teens online, as ill-advised but nonetheless harmless expressions of herd mentality. Indeed, I doubt the kids are aware of how they contribute to the racist restructuring of beauty standards, but most people are not aware of how structures of power inform their understandings and behaviors, especially “personal” ones like beauty choices. That said, when it feels as though we are two trend cycles away from bringing back phrenology under a more hashtagable name, it is far past time to pay attention. If teens are mere sheep, look for the shepherd. 

American Words, American Lives

The past three and a half years of the Trump presidency have introduced many privileged Americans to a new sensation: distrust. Donald Trump has told the most recorded lies of any sitting president—but, of course, that’s only if you believe the fact-checkers. Fake news and false information are nothing new under this administration, but the undercutting of media takes on a whole new meaning in light of COVID-19. Trump’s common use of misinformation and the way news sites cover it has been dangerous from the start, but when it comes to this new disease it’s turned deadly.

Take Colorado. On Sunday, April 19th, photos captured by Alyson McClaran and video recorded by the Twitter user @MarcZenn surfaced of a peculiar standoff: a nurse with sunglasses, an N95 mask, and the usual green scrubs stands with his arms folded in a crosswalk while a middle-aged blond woman hangs out the window of her RAM truck, a protest sign slapped across her windshield and a “USA” jersey on. She, part of an anti-lockdown gridlock, can be heard yelling “You get to go to work. Why can’t I?”and “If you want communism, go to China!” at the man, who does not answer.

This interaction is one of many taking place across multiple states, as self-professed conservatives demand that businesses reopen to protect the economy in the face of a global pandemic. Most Colorado protestors were in cars, but in other states demonstrators gathered in large crowds without proper distancing or protection. But their safety, or the safety of those they might come into contact with, is not the main concern. They brought everything from signs to automatic machine guns to their demonstrations, demanding that Governors repeal their stay-at-home orders. These manifestations are only the newest display of a deeply divided America. The protests and counter-protests show that division, but so too does news coverage and government response.

At the time of “Operation Gridlock”, Colorado had nearly 10,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 420 deaths from the disease. This fact was reported in all articles written about the demonstration, but similarities stopped there. The Fox News article “Coronavirus standoff: Photos purportedly show Colorado health care workers at odds with anti-lockdown protesters” by Greg Norman focuses on the fact that more people have filed for unemployment than died, and that the photographed nurses refused to state their names or where they worked (hardly incomprehensible, when doctors have been fired for speaking about a lack of PPE). Fox News stated that thousands of protestors drove out, and omitted any quotes from the photographed woman. The CNN article “Health workers face anti-lockdown protesters in dramatic photos” by David Williams quoted the demonstrator right off the bat and stated that “hundreds” of people participated, not thousands, before putting out a few statistics about the protests across the country, and the percentage of stay-at-home orders. The two news sites diverge in their political leanings, and the identity of their readerships could not be clearer. Conservatives see an overblown response suppressing their financial capacity. Liberals see a dangerous, uninformed pushback against logical sanctions.

Colorado Governor Jared Polis has responded by announcing the guidelines that will be instituted after April 26th, when the stay at home order expires. Some businesses will begin to reopen as a transition through May 4th, where these “safer at home” guidelines will be re-evaluated and widened. The President’s response is slightly different. He tweeted three separate tweets to “LIBERATE” Michigan, Minnesota and Virginia. Other states have been left unnamed, but many reporters noted that the three that Trump named have Democratic Governors. Federal response to the protests has been mixed. As the BBC reports:

“President Donald Trump and his White House have expressed seemingly opposing views on the protests. Last week, Mr Trump and his Covid-19 taskforce unveiled new guidance to begin re-opening state economies [which has not been yet used by states]…But a day after the administration’s plan was announced, the president tweeted the slogans of the “Liberate” protests in several Democratic-run states.”

This duality of information and statements has become the status quo, but proves to be more confusing than ever. COVID-19 is the new frontier for smear campaigns against “fake news” and criticism of mainstream media. For instance, when looking for footage of Denver’s Operation Gridlock on Youtube you would come across an ad for Epoch Times, which claimed to have uncovered government corruption ignored by “institutional media” that “makes Watergate look like nothing in comparison.” When the President’s strategy is to undercut news and redefine criticism as falsity, his supporters are quick to doubt reports of mismanagement and vulnerability.

But the mismanagement of this pandemic—from the Administration’s refusal to distribute tests and respirators to states to its encouragement of these protests—threatens everyone. These Americans could avoid exposure if they chose to stay home as recommended. Those who are in danger of poverty due to job loss could lobby for more comprehensive support for unemployed Americans—perhaps closer to the $2000 per month Canadian citizens will receive. The problem is that the falsehoods of politicians have masked the very real risk of infection. For the first time, Trump’s encouragement of the disruptive, violent attitude of his supporters endangers them and others. And when they fall ill—which a projected third will—the people that treat them will be the nurses they screamed at.