Giving Shobhaa De a taste of her own medicine

Shobhaa De, an Indian columnist and author recently stirred up a storm by mocking an obese cop and posting his picture on Twitter. The social media trollers along with the cops reacted to that in a very strong way. Then the cop who was actually mocked came out and shared his side of the story. Here is my take on the entire episode.

1. Body shaming someone is not great irrespective of their gender. I am sure the entire reaction of Shobhaa De would have been different had someone posted picture of her. As an advocate of feminism and equal rights, she has to behave in way more dignified manner.
2. It is not freedom of expression when you take picture of someone else and post it on social media without their knowledge. You don’t even know this person. It is the kind of mindless behaviour that is causing psychological trauma to millions of people all over the world.
3. Her second tweet saying ‘No offence intended’ is actually worse than the first. It is a blatant lie. She did mean to offend. She should at least stand up to what she did. It was neither an apology nor ownership. It is not even humour.
4. People are obese for various reasons. I am sure she didn’t think of posting a picture of one of Mukesh Ambani’s sons when he was obese. Not everyone can afford a Bollywood style dietician.
5. Finally, she took credit for her despicable act resulting in some decent result. Formation of Isreal doesn’t mean you can justify Holocaust. She then continued with the pun stating that the police need to take fitness seriously.  I am sure that is not a great insight. It doesn’t make her look smart either. It is like someone saying, people should eat healthy food and expect everyone to admire at the insight.

Finally, she is expecting media to leave people like Gurmehar Kaur alone. I agree with that but is interesting coming from her mouth. I am sure she will hate it when people troll her. If you break fundamental disciplines then expect people to give you a taste of your own medicine. You are a troller and you will get trolled. I don’t think you deserve sympathies. Feminism and free speech need better advocates than people like you.