THESE MEMES PROVE THAT OUR WELL-INTENTIONED SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS NOT WITHSTANDING, THERE IS A CASTEIST LURKING WITHIN US, DOING 'JUST SAVARNA THINGS'
Cries of 'Say No To Institutionalised Communalism' and 'Kill Casteism, Promote Equality' reverbated across the country in the aftermath of UoH scholar Rohith Vemula's suicide. And many “mortified“, self-confessed “liberals“ among us would have readily agreed that ending caste based discrimination is indeed the need of the hour. Why, we would have even 'liked' and 'shared' these sentiments on our social media pages. But is this internet outrage merely lip service? Is our 'casteist' mentality something that runs deeper?
https://www.facebook.com/justsavarnathings/
One look at the satirical memes churned out under the hashtag 'Just Savarna Things', might just prove that sadly, that is the bitter truth: Our well intentioned self-righteousness not withstanding, there is a casteist lurking within us, doing 'just Savarna things'.
A dig at Savarnas -someone who belongs to one of the four Varnas, i.e. Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Sudra -the memes poke fun at underlying caste stereotypes. A scathing meme based on Rohith Vemula's suicide, calling out the hypocrisy of the “casteless Indian“, has resonated with Hyderabad's angry student community.Talking about the genesis of this fast-going-viral page, the admin, who did not wish to be identified, says, 'It all started when one of us wrote a post which satirised the `liberal Indian' and tagged it as 'Just Savarna Things'. The post was a hit, and got a lot of comments.
Everyone seemed to identify with this scenario where the 'upper caste liberal' talks and acts in contradictory ways. So we decided to create an exclusive page and create a meme for each comment. That's how 'Just Savarna Things' came about. But now, we also write new content based on latest socio-political developments.'
SOURCE
29 January 2016
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