A democracy sustains because of its population. Safeguarding the rights of all the minority groups is one of the most important credentials for a democratically elected government. As the fourth pillar of democracy, media becomes the undisputed voice of the voiceless. The voiceless refers to the ones who are generally underrepresented in political, economic and social orders. These minority groups from time immemorial have been influenced and manipulated in the way a majoritarian government wants.
Often, history has given us examples where good influence has raised revolutions by minorities or the oppressed communities. As Karl Marx mentioned in his book Communist Manifesto, “All previous historical movements were movements of minorities, or in the interest of minorities,” even the struggle to uproot a different nation by Muslim league was brought upon to protect the interest of a minority group. (Its implication and morality is another debate.)
To analyze the effects of media on minority, it is necessary to study their representation in the first place. So, the way in which the media projects minorities must be looked at. From a very Indian perspective, media representation of minorities has been minimal in art, cinema and culture.
The mainstream movies of ’70s , ’80s and ’90s came with patty-bun formulae of a male protagonist fighting against a male antagonist with a pinch of masala and romance in between. This gave little space for accommodating the interest of minorities. Nevertheless, when India got independent, there was an attempt to project the wrath of partition and lives of Muslims and the poor in India with films like “Garm Hava” and “Do Beegha Zameen”.
Bollywood, during the years after Independence, was blessed to have an artist named Guru Dutt, who in that era directed “Pyaasa”, a beautiful movie which elucidated the misery of prostitutes. Relative to the time it was made it, it is a very unconventional but remarkable step to represent a community which is generally used to project sexual desires and sensuality in movies. But this was short lived as the audience-pulling capacity of such films was very low.
With the onset of the late 90s, new directors came to project underrepresented groups and sensitive issues in mainstream movies. Veterans like Mani Ratnam who with his trilogy ‘Bombay’, ‘Roja’ and ‘Dil Se’ gave a new perspective to the grievances of Muslims and inter-religious couples in India.
But the real wave of unconventional projection came way too late in the early years of the 21st century with the exodus of directors like Anurag Kashyap, Prakash Jha and Nandita Das. The issue of the LGBT community, which for a very long remained ignored, were subtly catered to the mainstream audience in the 2016 with the film “Kapoors and Sons”. The rareness of minority representation can be understood by the movie “Finding Fanny” which portrays Anglo-Indian people exclusively, it was the only mainstream film to feature A-rate Bollywood actors in a movie themed on Anglo-Indians in many years.
Now, when we move to the west, this divide is even more visible. The dark chapter of racism and segregation still haunts The United States. Hollywood, the mecca of art and cinema, has cultivated a narrative of segregation “implicitly” though its movies. Before the dawn of 21st century, Black Americans could barely be seen in Hollywood movies. And when they were, they were stereotyped as either comedians or villains. A very typical representation that everyone who has watched a Hollywood movie of ’90s or early 2000s would remember is black men roaming around in shady backyards waiting to pick-pocket or murder somebody. That picture of black men in the mainstream has done a lot of damage to their projection in general in front of the world.
Black women, if present on screen, were either maid servants or cabre singers or dancers. In 2013, Lee Daniels directed a movie called “The Butler”, story of a black butler in the White House since Dwight Eisenhower’s tenure who lived to see Barack Obama enter the White House as the first African American US President. The movie won a lot of accolades but couldn’t shine well among masses. This taboo got broken as late as in 2018 when Marvel released “Black Panther”, a full featured film with all black American characters. It was a breakthrough as it featured blacks with such attention and dignity for the very first time. It surpassing the 1 Billion mark on box office is a highlight of our changing cult.
Women, if considered a minority in terms of representation, were for a very long ousted from being casted as leads. But in 2017, DC Comics’ “Wonder Woman” garnered the 1 Billion mark at the box office, making it the 1st film with a woman protagonist to do so. LGBT community also saw a positive change in acceptance when “Call Me By Your Name” won academy awards in 2018.
News media has helped change the perspective through which people look at minority and liberate minorities to think independently. The New York Times, Washington Post, Guardian, etc. have a very liberal approach towards society and projects minorities with political correctness. Their teams also consists of a very diverse demographic to welcome every view point.
But this sort of representation can have dire consequences too. To exemplify this, in 2017 artist Kendrick Lamar came up with his album “Damn”. “I’ll prolly die anonymous, I’ll prolly die walking back home” read the lyrics of one song. This was to encompass the fear people of colour face in a predominantly White America. Few days later, a Muslim woman while heading back home from a mosque, was killed by a white teen in a manner discussed in the song. The fears being talked about in such songs has a very negative connotation. Their belief in institutions like the police also fades away. The polarization and misunderstanding between law enforcement agencies and blacks is very vivid already with police officials killing 142 African Americans in 2017 over trivial matters.
However, Lee Daniels’ “The Butler” and Marvel’s “Black Panther” represent a shifting trend in Hollywood.
If we consider books, renowned authors have used the might of their pens to orchestrate the pain and anguish of minorities profoundly, often aiding them to stand up and raise their voices. Among others “Funny Boy” by Shyam Silvadurai raised important questions of sexual identity and existence.
Literature or culture is made up of the contemporary society. And a society can’t sustain without plurality of cultures. Even when the media is audited by the majority, responsibility lies on them to project each and every voice irrespective of their quantitative composition so that they find their due acceptance along with everyone else. And as Ayn Rand rightly said “Individual rights are not subject to a public vote; a majority has no right to vote away the rights of a minority; the political function of rights is precisely to protect minorities from oppression by majorities”.