Fake Ban Culture or What?

Some days ago, someone forwarded me a video of a very famous VJ Mathira. The other clip showed that she was kind of abused and harassed by some live callers. At times she is projected as a very smart and outspoken at times. Most of the times I would say, she does it that way. At first I got quite annoyed with the live callers, but if watched closely, the poor live callers aren’t there to be blamed. Or shall they be blamed?  or 50 % both are to be blamed? The lady dresses up very cheaply and at times uses indecent facial gestures during her live call sessions. The only thing I could praise about her was the way she bashed the live caller very confidently. 

There shouldn’t be any objection on the yoga show that she used to do some time back.  Or there should be? One should be able to digest the yoga sessions by her. The vulgarity and obscenity standards are even relative: they vary for different people.  There may be a set of well- defined and written procedures for defining obscenity one is talking about the simple obscenity standards that are formed in human mind. One can understand very quickly if something is obscene or vulgar. 

Coming to the team, some media people are like that such live calls are usually dropped. The moment they find someone exceeding his limits, they usually drop the live call. How come that they didn’t get it dropped this time? Was it a deliberate attempt by the team? First of all, why can’t the team i.e. producer or any other stop her from using such free-style language and gestures? Isn’t there anyone to watch her dress code or language being used? Keeping a check on the live calls? What regulations and code of ethics is being followed by the channel and host? Does the channel team encourage her to get more and more live calls? Are they trying to compete with MTV Love line? What’s the objective?

An old video by a band Rushk was banned after receiving several months of airplay. Even a report in 2006 said the same that Pakistani channels were banning music videos without any logical reason or valid justification to the musicians. The videos Behti naar, Pal do pal, Jalan and Main nahi hoon received criticism. Why not ban or criticize the obscenity shows by this particular channel? Let’s flash back: The Hasan siblings’ “Hum aur Tum” was even criticized badly in 1980s. All these never really deserved banning. Why double standards of banning are being followed?

Coming back to the show is the image projection done. Either the VJ or the channel is responsible for it? If the channel is, the lady is being exploited by her. Is this a publicity stunt or promotion kind stuff by the channel or the channel is exploiting her as an entertainment product for giving them more viewership? Or is the channel just trying to get a niche with her? Now if PEMRA blocked some channels, what about this one? Is there some well defined code of conduct or ethics for this one? What it could be? Flash Back again to 1990s where most of us would use to wait for Music Channel Charts. The VJs were dressed perfectly. Was there any element of obscenity or vulgarity to make the show better or gain more viewership? There wasn’t any obscenity. Being liberal and broad-minded is good, but promoting vulgarity and obscenity through something could never be taken as a symbol of appreciation and liberalism.  Such shows hardly present any open-mindedness or progressiveness. 

The Post was published in Express Tribune, with some changes......