Saturday, 10 November 2012

Angry Birds: Part 1 of 2




Once spoken, words can't be taken back.

We see the impact of thoughtlessly used words around us all the time. And we know from observations in our daily lives that when someone is hurt by words, they do not forget them easily.

Social media has provided people an additional platform to express themselves. And while ordinarily, the sense to be careful with your words should have extended to the social media, it does not seem to have.

And what surprises me is that there seems to be a quick punishment for expressing without any forethought or premeditation.

Very recently, I came across this case when a tweet from an Indian landed him in prison!

On 20 October, Ravi Srinivasan posted a tweet to his 16 followers saying that Karti Chidambaram, a politician belonging to India's ruling Congress party and son of Finance Minister P Chidambaram, had "amassed more wealth than Vadra".

Karti Chidambaram did not take the tweet in good humour and filed a police complaint on 29 October.

They arrested Mr Srinivasan early next morning, charged him under Section 66A of India's Information Technology [IT] Act, and demanded 15 days of police custody. Pondicherry's chief judicial magistrate declined remand and granted bail.

That was some quick reaction from the police!

While Rahul Gandhi is not on twitter yet, for all those tweeting, even in jest, about Robert Vadra and the Gandhi family, should really think twice henceforth…:D

This made me look back to a few more episodes caused by the twitterati.

Many people of international repute have been caught in the harsh light of twitter scandals. The types of scandals in which they have been involved, cover a wide range of types. They include nasty comments, intimate photos (mistakenly or otherwise) sent to the public.

The incidents affected the people involved in various ways. Apart from public humiliation, while some have been sued, some threatened with legal action, some have lost lucrative advertising deals simply by virtue of being careless with their words.

Take the case of the recent London Olympics help this year.

Greek triple-jumper Voula Papachristou made history July 25th, 2012 as the first Olympian to ever be banned from the games for a tweet.

She published a racist tweet, stating “So many Africans in Greece. At least, west Nile mosquitos will eat homemade food.”

Within 3 days the Greek Olympic committee issued a statement deeming her social media content “contrary to the values and ideals of the Olympic movement.”

The athlete was officially banned from competing in the upcoming Olympics due to her tasteless tweet. Papachristou even apologized but the 23 year-old athlete has not managed to win any sympathy since her open criticism for her punishment as “highly excessive.”

Michel Morganella, a Swiss soccer player, made an inappropriate statement and described South Koreans as a "bunch of mentally handicapped retards”. It was something he said in the heat of the moment. And though he apologized later, the damage had been done. The Swiss team sent Morganella home.

Morganella was the second athlete of these Games to cost himself a place on his team for his racist and unsportsmanlike tweets.

Stephanie Rice, an Australian swimming star found herself in deep trouble after a remark on Twitter after the Australian football team, the Wallabies, won a game against the Springboks in South Africa.  She called the South African team, ‘f**gots’. This is regarded by many as a term of abuse against homosexuals.

Rice lost a lucrative sponsorship deal with Jaguar. She also had to give up the Jaguar car that she was given by the brand…!

Does it occur to you that there is a steep price to pay for just a few loosely stated words? What we consider as a freedom of expression and our right to voice our opinion, could land us in trouble if we are not careful about just how are thoughts are communicated.

To be continued:

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