Young minds are exposed daily to fake news, propaganda and permissive social networks
A virus more dangerous than COVID-19 is on the prowl for easy prey. Bigotry. It works on a fast transmissible platform. Social media. It infects the country’s source of future wealth: Youth. The ‘Bulli Bai’ app that represents a depraved mindset is a case in point. The web-based app hosted morphed photographs and objectionable statements hurting Muslim women. The police have arrested four youngsters so far. Neeraj Bishnoi allegedly created the app. He is an engineering student. Shweta Singh is only 19 and reportedly posted extreme content. Mayank Rawat, 21, allegedly shared links of extreme posts. Vishal Kumar Jha, also 21, allegedly used multiple Twitter handles to post objectionable content against Muslim women. They come from different States, different backgrounds, different career objectives. The social media world connects them. A twisted mindset plagued by communal hatred binds them. They are bright, have a grasp of current affairs, and had targets to achieve in life. Deep inside, however, lay trapped a sinister personality that surfaced whenever they entered the dark world of the web. The fate that now awaits them should send shudders down the spine of other youth who might see no harm in spreading communal poison. The families of the four youth will forever be stigmatised. They will watch media trials of their children. The neighbours might shun them. The universities might expel them. Their college life is ruined and their dreams might die in a cold cell of a prison. Is it worth it?
Worse, the four youth would not have known anything about Muslim women in general, let alone about the women whose character they assassinated in public. The youth and adolescents of the country are most vulnerable today to online radicalisation. The word is used not just in the context of terrorism but applies to all anti-social actions. In these days of unfettered access of the youth to the web and social media, they need not make a special effort to get acquainted with obscene campaigns or divisive politics. Rather, these distortions find their way to them. It is up to a vulnerable, immature or unthinking mind to lap it all up, get carried away and join the mob. The impressionable minds are exposed daily to fake news, doctored facts, propaganda politics and permissive social networks where women are the natural subjects for abuse and trolling. Much of it is highly sexualised, coloured by communal innuendo. They continuously receive threats of rape, death, acid attacks and, the latest, auctions. Sexual bullying of women in the public sphere is now an international phenomenon with the selection of victims according to their religion being a sought-after operation. Here is a thought for the country’s youth: Bigotry and communal hatred lurks in the underbelly of social media, championed by sick minds intent on destroying society’s sanity. They brainwash unsuspecting youth and applaud them till the latter self-destruct. They will then go in search of another family.
