Mental health professionals and researchers of social media often advise us not to start the day by doomscrolling on social media. It wreaks havoc with our mental health. More importantly, there are the very real dangers of becoming comfortably numb. After all, if every morning brings fresh horrors of decapitated children, forest fires, landslides, new wars amidst ongoing ones, lynchings and so on and so forth, at some point, do we not stop caring and look away? But then looking away also raises more questions than answers. Who can afford to look away? Who can afford to not care?
Of course, these are not new questions. Social media driven saturation may be new but majoritarian apathy is not. Time and again history has painfully taught us that the most disenfranchised have had to resort to deadly, spectacular protests to cut through indifference and disregard to draw attention to their pain and suffering. Yet, I want to learn from a scholar of history if in times past, there was a wellness industrial complex as deeply entrenched in daily lives as today. Was there a coercive will to be optimistic, joyful, happy at all times?
Think of West Bengal for example. Over the last couple of years or so, news channels begin the countdown to Durga Puja, not a week or 10 days before anymore. The countdown starts at 100, 99, 98 . . . Festivals will be here soon – 365 days of some festival or the other – be happy!
News channels air yoga shows to promote positivity. Harness your inner potential, says your favourite superstar. Universities are asked to present the shining glorious history of the nation state to inculcate positivity about the country. Health gurus ask you to consume avocado and chia seeds and quinoa for unleashing your inner efficient innovator. Therapy speak has become commonsensical. The joke goes I am ready to date you if you can pay for my therapy post our breakup. The catalogue is never ending, but scratch the surface only slightly and the edifice falls apart like your nearest shining airport or the Parliament.
The point is who has the purchasing power to splurge on yearlong festivals (designer weddings with drone photo shoots, professional filmmakers, colour coordinated ceremonies)? Who has the means to go organic as per western standards and not your local food chain? Who can afford therapy and so on. When the State and every single structure that is supposed to enshrine rights for all start speaking only in the language of that minuscule minority which can spend and hog all the space, can we say, it is perhaps ethical to not be happy and joyful all the time? From the alarming rate at which health and education have been privatized to the steady dilution of affirmative action, the divide keeps becoming sharper.
Another Pride Month went by. A hundred corporate-sponsored workshops, panels, rainbow parties with drag queens and queer celebrities, colourful centerspreads later, activists are back to countering sensationalist media deadnaming murdered trans women. There is not much data on how many gender nonconforming folks have managed to survive in the jobs that were given to them and splashed widely on social media. The central government does not even give the peanuts it promised for trans livelihood schemes and shelters homes regularly. Meanwhile, some cannot stop fretting over why they do not have marriage rights. Decriminalization has been achieved and now marriage is the final outpost. The chasm between the various sets of demands keeps deepening.
An image from the ‘Kolkata Rainbow Pride Walk’ in 2022 is imprinted in my mind. A dandy queer slips into a Starbucks that the pride walk was crossing. He picks up coffees while his partner or friend waits for him outside, holding the leash of their dog. Then, he steps out and the two walk the pride with their coffees and the dog. A pride is a family gathering, a stroll in a park. Meanwhile, the Hijras are busy at the traffic signals earning their daily living. They do not have time for the pomp and all the fun and positivity. Food must be on the plate. It is that simple.
I do not mean to downplay the very real consequences of a mental health crisis, but what I am questioning is this individualized model of wellness that seems to have gripped so many of us. By us, I mean the target audience of this webzine, the ones who consume such media. What is health outside of our immediate context?
So, that is all this editorial has to offer – skepticism, doubt, negativity. In this flood of celebrations everywhere, may we find the nerve to not look away for long from the world as it is unravelling. May we ask the right questions. Sometimes we do not even question. We happily sing along and come back to our homes. May we find the strength to be the noise amidst this superficial harmony. It is okay, perhaps necessary, to hold onto shame amidst all the pride.
Since this article came out in July 31, a lot has happened. And yet we see over and over again how the outrage is selective. While the innate need is to survive and find ways to remain happy. But what does the “happy” mean ? The capitalistic world likes us to be on a continuous search for happiness so that they can keep lining up things along the way. In the meantime to have the ability to wake up , make coffee and sit on the balcony sipping it and watching the world waking up is happiness enough for me.