How Bollywood is destroying us

Hemant Kumar

To facilitate themselves, humans have invented countless great things and always modify them to meet their needs. But, with the passage of time, it showed some of its shortcomings as well. Risen of criminal behavior among adolescents and teenagers is one of it, and in this article we will unearth those factors and find the link between them.

Adolescence and teenage is a time period when kids grow both mentally and physically and work on their foundations. This can also be called the most crucial time for the kids and related parents. Many researchers throughout the world have studied on this age group and found the results that most of the kids from age 8-18 devote approx. 7 hr. 38 minutes average. Other reports suggested that 87% of the Indian kids spend more than enough time on internet, which plays an important role in molding their mindset. In 1985, when the feature of videography was about to be added with typography in internet, Neil Postman, an expert showed his concern over this feature. He was quite sure that videography will definitely affect the people’s way of decision in irrational ways, because one cannot judge the whole event rationally just by watching pictures and videos. Unfortunately, his concern seems to be true in today’s world. Digital screens now gained total access over human brain, as people started believing everything what they see on screen. One particular section of digital screen participants is using this shortcoming to be popular, and continuously indulge themselves in such projects which include objectionable content. This has resulted the awaken of criminal tendency, curiosity for sexual intercourse in early age, and most deadly, living a reel life among kids as they are at most vulnerable age of life. Before we discuss how these creations give impact on kids and why creators are high on making such creations, first have a look on the inclination of kids towards crime since the last decade in India:-

• In the year 2017 alone, 40k juveniles caught for perpetrating, 72% were 16-18 years old.
• Rapes by juveniles increased by 11 times from 1991-2016 (from 189 in 1991 to 2,054 in 2016).
• In the same period (1991-2016) IPC crimes seen the spike by 3.3 times. (Shows the increase in sex related crime tendency).
• Huge no of juvenile perpetrators were come from low income house. (Up to rs. 25,000).
• Inclination towards heinous crimes is also ascending in teenagers. NCRB 2016 data shows overall 6,645 cases of heinous crimes were committed by juveniles in only 19 metropolitan cities.
• Involvement in serious crimes with adults is also a matter of concern.
• Crimes by student studied up to matric and higher secondary increased to 6,260 in 2016 to 4,244 in 2017.(approx. 32% rise)
• Delhi alone seen the rise of 11.5% juvenile crime in 2017 than previous year.

Now the question rises why these movies loved by many viewers and makers when they have such a bad impact on juveniles, and if it so, then why they make creations like this. There can be multiple reasons for it and one of it lies in the child psychology. According to the research conducted on the kids about the influence of bad and good things on them, it showed some of its fascinating facts. Research found that kids in early age incline towards negative things more than the positive ones, which is called “Negativity Bias”. That is why juveniles love to watch those creations which include violence, vulgarity, quarrels, and many more, but those creators are not kid, then why they become participants of such shows. Aftermath of movie “Drishyam” is widely known by everyone when people just started planning abduction and murder as same as showed in movie. Then think about the aftermath of all the movies releasing today consist of material like this on the kids. Potential reasons behind the peak of these creations:

• Young population:- India is most young country throughout the world which has 50% of its population under age 25, 65% of total population is in under 35 of age, and 28% of total population is under 14. This variance of young population is motivating them to create such projects, so they can just provoke the negativity bias in kids and can make them habitual of watching such creations. We can say just for earning more and more money they intentionally do such projects.
• Fake modernization and feminism:- These two terms play an important role in this campaign. Actually, they are a part of community who are stuck in two thoroughly different cultures i.e., Eastern culture, and Western culture. They took birth in eastern culture but obsessed to follow the western culture on the name of modernization. To do this, they provoke themselves to display the more modern way of life than them, and ultimately ends up with the creation full of sensual events, and objectionable words. Then comes a concept of fake feminism, which gained a lot of popularity in the recent past years, especially in India. According to their reel feminism which is quite different than the real one, a woman should use abusive words, should wear only western and short dresses, must be alcoholic, chain smoker, and more qualities like this, only then it could be called the “Women Empowerment”.
• Easy to make:- Nowadays, shooting movies have become far easier than early before. You need nothing else than a protagonist who can be ready to do adult role, either male or female. And for that role they target the section of newcomer actors/ actresses who come to the industry every year and seek the role. Helplessness of these pupils help the directors to make such movies like these.
• Movies for adults:- Now, this is the best reason that can be given to censor board whenever any movie find objectionable. On the name of 18+ movies they just fill the whole movie with sensual activities and abusive way of speaking. One thing is to be noted that being 18+ doesn’t mean to be shameless and horny all the time. Kids belong to this age group have other feelings than sex too. This excuse should not work as a shield that young adults are free to involve in sexual intimacy that is why majority of movies can be like this.

Their hunger of money can be identified by the fact that every 6-8 out of 10 movies/ web series contain cringe content like this. Apart of the reported crimes, effect of these creations can be easily seen in the behavior of viewers. Level of anger, erotic feelings are increasing and respect for other are decreasing as using vulgar way of speaking has become a trend. These actions made kids so obsessed to living the reel life that sometimes they make those irredeemable mistakes which cannot be rectified throughout the life.

This scenario need to be reframed with a better vision, otherwise young nations like India will find itself in some inextricable problem the near future. In democracies like India, government cannot be the first mover in this initiative until people don’t take any further steps on it. For the well of ourselves and of our loved ones, we need to come further for this. 

Back to Home Page

Aug 10, 2020