Did someone say “sugar and spice and all things nice” make girls? Ha, this should teach you to be wary of stereotypes, especially those in nursery rhymes. A case in point, Tommy Stout may have been nicer than Tommy Thin, but not all those with adipose to spare are jolly. Look at Idi Amin. Look at the woman who nearly pushed me off a running bus. (Ok, mean-fat-people examples are getting scarcer and scarcer with our “size zero” fixation.)
But I digress. A few days ago my nerd-dom was firmly established and now I discover that I’m a bigot too. This is adding insult to injury, I tell you. Now that I’ve been found out for the unusual hybrid of a Ku-Klux-Klan member and Steve Urkle, my mum’s groom hunting has received a setback of biblical proportions, quite unbeknownst to her, poor dear. Us digressed again, my precious. Us has to stop running pell-mell. Where was us now? Oh yeah, bigotry.
My biases are many and varied. Some are not even logical or rational. They just are. Evidently, I’m a pathological bigot. And all this while, I’ve been pretending to be a purist or whatever-else-ist. But let’s not mince words. In the spirit of “outings”, let’s call a spade just that.
Sample my bigoted views.
Music bigotry
I judge people based on their taste in music. I will hang up on a person if I don’t like their caller tune. Heck, I won’t even be polite to them. Let alone fraternize with them in broad daylight. And I will air my disapproval quite overtly. Anyone who likes techno, trance or stuff that goes “dhichak-dhichak” is no friend of mine. People’s ringtones have to be tasteful too, or else. Who think Himesh Reshammiya is God’s gift to those with sound aural faculties- “I heartily invite such birds, to come outside and say those words”* .Those who go into whirling dervish trances on hearing the pretty boys from 98 Backstreet, Britney and her ilk, Shakira and her ridiculous lyrics, Enrique etc , had better stay away from me. I wouldn’t put unspeakable acts of cruelty past me, should the opportunity present itself. The list of those at whom I would crinkle up my nose is long and going strong.
Book bigotry
This close friend of mine once lent a guy Five Point Someone and a Wodehouse. The guy had the audacity to think the former funnier; he saw no humour in my beloved P.G.W. creation. Wodehouse compared with Chetan Bhagat. The nerve. This girl told me that she thought Catcher in the rye was trash, “Don’t recommend this to anyone ever again”, she said, right after going gaga over God of Small Things. Bloody murder, cried my inner Nazi. This is what I’m talking about-those who read Nancy Drew, Mills and Boons, Daniel Steele, Sidney Sheldon and such atrocities and call themselves discerning readers and actually, and this is rich, recommend these books and then maddeningly enough compare a Sidney Sheldon with O.Henry. It’s like comparing Marlon Brando with, oh I don’t know, Adam Sandler may be? I am busy thinking up something violent and macabre for such criminal ignorance.
Food bigotry
Veg. Manchurian (which in itself is a mongrel of sorts) with Naan, Tandoori chicken/paneer pizzas- another hybrid, diet/sugar-free mithai- either eat these the conventional way with tons of ghee and sugar or don’t eat at all, papad with everything (lasagna and papad, falafel and papad, fries and papad), adding dollops of ketchup to food- it kills the inherent taste of whatever you are eating, insipid and diluted coffee, cookies/biscuits with no character-plain bland varieties not worthy of human consumption, non-chocolate candy- totally not worth the empty calories and sugar rush (Rich, dark, chocolate? ummm, now you’re talking!). These push my buttons in so many ways it’s not even funny. Gas chamber? Impaling? Firing squad?
Film bigotry
Those who think that a film is good just because it’s in a foreign language (read: English), not only have a colonial hangover but also have cheese for brains. So these people catch a C-grade English flick with Paris Hilton in the lead and then brag about watching an English film, “Oh look how sophisticated we are”. Engage them in a conversation about quality cinema (they have never even heard of The Godfather) and they will look at you like you are the interloping square egg and label you arrogant. One tight slap!
Language bigotry
Don’t even get me started on this one. This is where I am an inexorable purist. The normal, everyday language that we speak is peppered generously with words borrowed from other languages. I speak a curious mixture of English, Hindi and Bambaiya with my friends. Fair enough, ‘coz let’s face it, regional languages express some ideas more succinctly and beautifully than English does. My problem is with hybrid words- marofying, talofying, fekofying; take a verb in Hindi, suffix a –fy and voila, you have a stylish (?) new word. How I wish I could tolchok these words and their progenitors into oblivion. Also, copious usage of the word “like”- aaarghhh. I see those in the entertainment business lacking adjectives; almost anything can be qualified by the oft-repeated ones- “rocking”, “mind-blowing”, “amazing”, “awesome”, “sexy” (why, but, why?). I plan to buy them all their own personal copies of The Roget’s Thesaurus, even if it results in my bankruptcy.
I have made new enemies, haven’t I? Sigh.
But I digress. A few days ago my nerd-dom was firmly established and now I discover that I’m a bigot too. This is adding insult to injury, I tell you. Now that I’ve been found out for the unusual hybrid of a Ku-Klux-Klan member and Steve Urkle, my mum’s groom hunting has received a setback of biblical proportions, quite unbeknownst to her, poor dear. Us digressed again, my precious. Us has to stop running pell-mell. Where was us now? Oh yeah, bigotry.
My biases are many and varied. Some are not even logical or rational. They just are. Evidently, I’m a pathological bigot. And all this while, I’ve been pretending to be a purist or whatever-else-ist. But let’s not mince words. In the spirit of “outings”, let’s call a spade just that.
Sample my bigoted views.
Music bigotry
I judge people based on their taste in music. I will hang up on a person if I don’t like their caller tune. Heck, I won’t even be polite to them. Let alone fraternize with them in broad daylight. And I will air my disapproval quite overtly. Anyone who likes techno, trance or stuff that goes “dhichak-dhichak” is no friend of mine. People’s ringtones have to be tasteful too, or else. Who think Himesh Reshammiya is God’s gift to those with sound aural faculties- “I heartily invite such birds, to come outside and say those words”* .Those who go into whirling dervish trances on hearing the pretty boys from 98 Backstreet, Britney and her ilk, Shakira and her ridiculous lyrics, Enrique etc , had better stay away from me. I wouldn’t put unspeakable acts of cruelty past me, should the opportunity present itself. The list of those at whom I would crinkle up my nose is long and going strong.
Book bigotry
This close friend of mine once lent a guy Five Point Someone and a Wodehouse. The guy had the audacity to think the former funnier; he saw no humour in my beloved P.G.W. creation. Wodehouse compared with Chetan Bhagat. The nerve. This girl told me that she thought Catcher in the rye was trash, “Don’t recommend this to anyone ever again”, she said, right after going gaga over God of Small Things. Bloody murder, cried my inner Nazi. This is what I’m talking about-those who read Nancy Drew, Mills and Boons, Daniel Steele, Sidney Sheldon and such atrocities and call themselves discerning readers and actually, and this is rich, recommend these books and then maddeningly enough compare a Sidney Sheldon with O.Henry. It’s like comparing Marlon Brando with, oh I don’t know, Adam Sandler may be? I am busy thinking up something violent and macabre for such criminal ignorance.
Food bigotry
Veg. Manchurian (which in itself is a mongrel of sorts) with Naan, Tandoori chicken/paneer pizzas- another hybrid, diet/sugar-free mithai- either eat these the conventional way with tons of ghee and sugar or don’t eat at all, papad with everything (lasagna and papad, falafel and papad, fries and papad), adding dollops of ketchup to food- it kills the inherent taste of whatever you are eating, insipid and diluted coffee, cookies/biscuits with no character-plain bland varieties not worthy of human consumption, non-chocolate candy- totally not worth the empty calories and sugar rush (Rich, dark, chocolate? ummm, now you’re talking!). These push my buttons in so many ways it’s not even funny. Gas chamber? Impaling? Firing squad?
Film bigotry
Those who think that a film is good just because it’s in a foreign language (read: English), not only have a colonial hangover but also have cheese for brains. So these people catch a C-grade English flick with Paris Hilton in the lead and then brag about watching an English film, “Oh look how sophisticated we are”. Engage them in a conversation about quality cinema (they have never even heard of The Godfather) and they will look at you like you are the interloping square egg and label you arrogant. One tight slap!
Language bigotry
Don’t even get me started on this one. This is where I am an inexorable purist. The normal, everyday language that we speak is peppered generously with words borrowed from other languages. I speak a curious mixture of English, Hindi and Bambaiya with my friends. Fair enough, ‘coz let’s face it, regional languages express some ideas more succinctly and beautifully than English does. My problem is with hybrid words- marofying, talofying, fekofying; take a verb in Hindi, suffix a –fy and voila, you have a stylish (?) new word. How I wish I could tolchok these words and their progenitors into oblivion. Also, copious usage of the word “like”- aaarghhh. I see those in the entertainment business lacking adjectives; almost anything can be qualified by the oft-repeated ones- “rocking”, “mind-blowing”, “amazing”, “awesome”, “sexy” (why, but, why?). I plan to buy them all their own personal copies of The Roget’s Thesaurus, even if it results in my bankruptcy.
I have made new enemies, haven’t I? Sigh.
*Borrowed from Dorothy Parker. She said this of Charles Dickens:
“Who call him spurious and shoddy
Shall do it o’er my lifeless body.
I heartily invite those birds,
To come outside and say those words!”
Borrowed from Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange
“Who call him spurious and shoddy
Shall do it o’er my lifeless body.
I heartily invite those birds,
To come outside and say those words!”
Borrowed from Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange
