Parents and Media!

I had a PTM with my child's teacher recently. Amongst many things, what we discussed was that Kanu , my daughter sees lots of TV and lots of cartoons including Shinchen that I do not like! Shinchen is what the teacher proscribed completely!

Come to think of it, as a parent of growing kids, I can feel nothing but hassled by the fact that I need to make serious efforts to control the media consumption of my kids. Many parents will agree that our media is getting increasingly prurient by the day. From the time, a child switches on the TV , he or she is exposed to all kinds of indecent words, actions and scenes.

One of the realities about the reality shows especially the Dance ones is that they make it a point to keep the women participants as little clothed as they can, the so called item numbers leave little to imagination, the cartoon shows teach a lot of bad-tameezi.

Radio is better even though I have heard some RJs whose talk can best be classified as 'Phooharh'.. but Radio as a medium is much less popular than TV. Still there are many times when you hear a RJ trying to talk 'sexy'unnecessarily. This is because the poor guy thinks thats the only way to be popular!

Print is also not behind. From frequent so called Sexual revolution surveys that scream scandalous findings to printing pictures in the daily newspapers that would otherwise would have place in porn magazines,the effort is to bring adult stuff daily in your home, without your permission and perhaps with disastrous consequences.

I have worked with media. I know all about the "noble objective" of broadbasing the societal mind! The only mantra in play is Show what sells! The logical culmination of this thinking is also interesting and frightening..Imagine TV showing porn films at prime hours and newspapers becoming a "Debo" just because that is more lucrative - revenue wise.

Self censorship looks a possible way out.. but the violations in order to get a quick rise in TRPs and readerships will be far and frequent. What are the other ways?

Lets form a parents of growing kids forum that acts as a pressure group in matters like this. Are there any precedences anywhere else in the world?

What about a Parent networking site? Will it work..there we will discuss all things related to kids say from nursery admissions to media overkills! It may fetch us some millions also :-).

Happy Birthdays & Internet

There is a marked increase in the wishes coming my way in the last 2-3 years on 15th of Mays. Not that I am getting more popular as years pass by, but I am more approachable and accessible like never before. All thanks to Internet!

As I grow older, my old childhood friends like Tillu, Bablu and Bantu no longer call me on my birthdays. Not that the friendship is any less due to passing of years, but because they are not internet people and therefore there is no 'aided recall' through birthday alarm messages of sites like Orkut & Facebook.

Today, I have got almost 20 entries in my scrapbook on Orkut! all birthday wishes.. some from people i have not connected say in last 6 months..A cousin from London, Pallavi is also in conversation..She wants me to come there to take my party! How i wish the same could also have been got on orkut!

Then there are sites like Clickjobs,Netlog, Mutual Funds like DSP Merrill Lynch, Desi Martini, ICICI Direct and even I-mint all wishing me happy birthday! Coming to think of it, even though one knows all of this is automated but somehow no one minds getting good wishes!

What could be the possible next extension of this? Any Ideas?

Random thoughts!

This one is a myriad set of thoughts :
1. I dislike Shinchen!!
This cartoon kid is simply impudent, impolite and vulgar at times. The trouble is that kids love it and would try to emulate him wherever possible. Any remedies?

2. How to save Ram Setu?
Like a typical Congress approach, I now see Central government working towards demolition of Ram Setu that is essentially an object of faith. They have filed an affidavit to SC for the same!

Though I know that Ram does not need any one's support to do what He wants, but as a follower of Hinduism, I am uncomfortable with a polity that has no compunctions about hurting majority sentiments all the time!

3. Economic slowdown :
I think the Boom pundits have gone all wrong and the Doom Pundits have gone all right! Stock market has touched 14000 and there are talks of it bottoming out to 12000! God save us!