OUR 'JOBLESSNESS' IS AT ITS PEAK










Let’s accept it: Most of us spend a lot of time on social media – Whatsapp, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and so on. So, it makes no difference at all for people like me, who do not watch TV or listen to radio as many around do. Young kids, who are hooked on to video games, and, we adults, who are hooked on to social media – honestly, I find no difference in our respective addictions.

While we adults can get away by justifying our own addictions to social media, the little and young ones, who are at our mercy, can’t… at least majority of them. So, they have to go into hiding to play their games… We don’t have to.

Everyone’s mind is weak, including mine. My justification, for spending some of my time on FB, is my passion for writing. I have been writing since I was a college boy… I would write notes in my dairies… hundreds of hundreds of them, every day. It was only in 2008, I started writing my daily notes directly in my blog. I wasn’t on FB for another five years or so. Many of my well-wishers kept advising me to share my blog posts on FB so that I could reach out to many more. Thus, I got initiated into FB some five years ago. Later, like everyone else, WhatsApp happened… But, my exposure to social media is essentially confined to FB and to some extent Whatsapp…

But, then, whatever exposure I have, it is not only more than what I need, but it is also more than I can handle!

Frankly, life can be much peaceful and fruitful without any of them…

Luckily, I am not a compulsive addict when it comes to blindly sharing and forwarding posts and videos – left, right and centre. I do share selectively once in a while… But, not until I am convinced about its authenticity. I stay miles away from grapevine, and have a bad allergy for political, religious, malicious, hateful, divisive and vulgar ones.

A friend of mine, almost of my age, and a father of two young men, starts early in the morning and continues to do it till late at night – just send any useless crap. Of late, he had been sending posts against a certain religious community. I thought I would first advise him before unfriending him. I inboxed a short message conveying why he should restrain from such things. Mercifully, he did not get agitated. “Okay” he said…

Like all other addictions, this addiction, too, is difficult to get over. So, I am not sure, if my friend’s ‘Okay’ will really mean ‘OKAY’!

Another friend of mine, who is one of the ‘sanest’ when it comes to the use of social media, said to me, last night: “Look, years ago, there was a famous book by the title, ‘HOW TO READ A PERSON LIKE A BOOK’. Today, you can do it simply by a glance at the posts and videos they share and forward incessantly from dawn to dusk.”

I have already told you, this friend of mine is the ‘sanest’ in this respect!

Some years ago, a young girl was giving her introduction in one of our Public-speaking sessions. Talking about her hobbies, she said, “I watch TV only when I am jobless!”

The way this young one had said that, so casually yet so sincerely, made us all laugh, that day…

And, today, I really feel, that our ‘joblessness’ is at its peak!


GERALD D’CUNHA

Pic.: Rajesh R. Nair


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