Off late I’ve been watching women tag me in videos related to Delhi girls. What seems like an innocuous and funny video on first glance has heaps of cringeworthy stereotyping added. No matter where you’re from – South, North, West or East, if you’re a Delhi girl… wait for it.
iDiva is going to surmise your existence into a neat little video and make a mockery out of the whole idea of you just because you belong to a particular place. I didn’t follow the channel and after watching some of their content – from the web series “Dulha Wanted ” to “South Delhi girls” on which they’ve done a series of videos – I was enraged. I have to admit, at first it sounded fun, and I was amused, but in an age where women are fighting against stereotypes, why does ‘humour’ enjoy this special status? What is it about these videos and the non-serious genre they deploy that plots them so far from any visible critiquing?
How justified is it to put women wearing branded clothes and tons of makeup embody characters of domestic workers? If our idea of fun comes at the expense of another whose life and struggle we’re probably not even aware of, we need to question the disgusting layers of hypocrisy we’re clothed in.
For reckless stereotyping to pass off as journalism or media content, one must exist in ivory towers of nonchalance, completely removed from the ramifications – on an individual and societal level – of consuming content over social media. Stereotyping is what made misogyny, rape culture and “locker room talk” normal and to reproduce the idea that women everywhere in Delhi are potential gold diggers, does no good to any feminist stance.
I started watching their hugely popular web series “Dulha Wanted” and never before had I colossally wasted 20 minutes of my life. It is 2018 and to broadcast stories of a spoilt, aimless brat on the hunt to find a groom (because that’s really everything a woman’s life comes down to – no surprises) when you could use your opportunities and resources to reach out and set a better example or spread a strong social message is just brainless scriptwriting. Sure these things are clickbait and garner loads of eyeballs, but what are they doing to popular culture? The month when everybody took to social media to address rape culture, this hugely popular site was doing what it does best: producing more cringe-worthy videos on how women from Delhi use private jets to travel to the mall and bathe in Versace every day.
More than ever, today there is a need to question the proliferation of such content on the internet. Having been a journalist myself, if our idea of ‘fun’ as people in the media is all about creating content which reinforces stale stereotypes, distracting people from things that matter while contrarily upholding very strong feminist ethos on Instagram – who are we fooling?