Yet another “chaiwala” is making news, this time from across the border. Arshad Khan, quite literally the blue-eyed boy from Pakistan, has shot to fame courtesy a photo of his instagrammed by a Pakistani photographer. He’ll soon be a model, and might even star in movies. Too bad though that he won’t be able to milk the far richer Bollywood for some time to come.
Reactions to his photograph and the ensuing fame ranged from ecstatic loins to rolled eyes. There was one group though, that of the Eternally Peeved Feminazis, that couldn’t, as a matter of habit, hold back from making a mountain out of a molehill.
These days, whenever anything breaks out, I am only waiting for the pea-brained EPF to invent an angle that allows them to call for mass castration of all men on the planet. So this time, since the photographer was a woman and his subject was a man, I was relieved that the EPF would keep at an arm’s length. My relief was short-lived.
1. It is abhorrent to express surprise at his good looks despite his lower socio-economic strata: Ok, this is the motif of all EPF arguments – blind thyself to facts.
In the subcontinent, the poor people look uglier than their richer counterparts in a vast majority of cases. Of course, one can inflict further blindness by saying shit like “beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder”, but the truth won’t change. So what’s the harm if millions of people are pleasantly surprised at the charm of a chaiwala? Let's hope we see more such mascots of poor people's attractiveness to bridge the yawning gap.
In the subcontinent, the poor people look uglier than their richer counterparts in a vast majority of cases. Of course, one can inflict further blindness by saying shit like “beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder”, but the truth won’t change. So what’s the harm if millions of people are pleasantly surprised at the charm of a chaiwala? Let's hope we see more such mascots of poor people's attractiveness to bridge the yawning gap.
2. Calling him “chaiwala” is derogatory: Clearly, the EPF live in a world where they sip tea of all colours except yellow, that too exclusively from vending machines, and go “eww, look at those spots on his shirt” when they see a drops of tea fall on the shirt of a real chaiwala while he expertly pours it from a wide vessel into a narrow glass. In the subcontinent, chaiwala is an important, if not honourable, occupation. During Modi’s campaign, except the one instance where Mani Shankar Aiyar – who clearly sips tea only from vending machines – meant “chaiwala” as a derogatory epithet, it was used only to signal Modi’s lower socio-economic strata, and never to suggest that he had ever been a dishonourable man. In his interviews, Arshad himself proudly admits to being a chaiwala.
The EPF lament that no one bothered to find out his name long after he'd gone viral, instead preferring to call him "chaiwala". Well, I didn't see any EPF approaching him to do this noble deed. After all, it was the very media outlets that they brand irritating and disruptive that bothered to eventually find out his name. If anything, "chaiwala" acted as a catchy slogan to gain him quick and widespread popularity. Does anyone remember the real name of the girl pictured below?
The EPF lament that no one bothered to find out his name long after he'd gone viral, instead preferring to call him "chaiwala". Well, I didn't see any EPF approaching him to do this noble deed. After all, it was the very media outlets that they brand irritating and disruptive that bothered to eventually find out his name. If anything, "chaiwala" acted as a catchy slogan to gain him quick and widespread popularity. Does anyone remember the real name of the girl pictured below?
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| The Afghan Girl |
3. Craze for his blue eyes and light skin is colonial baggage: This is a recurrence of the motif mentioned in point 1. The truth is that blue eyes and light skin look eye-poppingly gorgeous, more so to people from subcontinent because they rarely possess those traits themselves. Several studies done on babies at least partially establish this, though since eugenics is a no-go area thanks to EPF and PC Warriors, much more needs to be done in this area of study. In all my travels through the West, I have not been accompanied by one Indian, and this includes females, who didn’t have their tongue hanging out at the very traits mentioned above. In fact, I would go as far as to say that the presence of these traits in our multinational European colonizers made their job easier.
4. Arshad Khan could be photographed and his photo circulated on social media only because he’s poor: Whhhaaatt? Are we forgetting Princess Diana’s death, Deepika Padukone’s cleavage splash on TOI, and countless other instances when the richest, most powerful people on the planet have been clicked without consent and driven to insanity.
5. It would be better had the photographer tried to engage with the subject, including an “effin selfie” (I don’t understand the big deal about writing “fucking”, but that’s a non-sequitur issue): The EPF forget that the “effin selfie” is the most heinous way of condescending and romanticising the poor and poverty, something that they warn vehemently against right before they lament the alleged lack of engagement. A selfie with a person of a lower socio-economic strata is nothing but conscience laundry, often used by white people strutting around the subcontinent to embellish their resume. Besides, what do the EPF expect the photographer to do anyway? Go up to the chaiwala and find out his painful life story and pen an op-ed on it? What have the EPF done except, oh, penning an op-ed on him. The EPF also lament that Arshad's fame on social media has unfolded in a language unknown to him. Well, so has their critique. Sadly, Arshad will never know how this bunch of do-gooders tried to fight the injustice done to him.
6. The EPF don’t like how everything in this episode has revolved around the chaiwala’s “physical features”: Dear EPF, this isn’t 22nd century yet where the viewers of a photo can dive into it to talk to its subject, and in this case, taste the chai he makes. So far, they can only admire what they see. Moreover, unlike your kind, most humans don’t possess the eyesight that lets them see the misogyny hidden behind the bikini girls printed on a scientist’s shirt.
7. His fame caused him much embarrassment and disrupted his life: Embarrassment? Dressed in a suave black jacket barely a day after his photo went viral, a beaming Arshad couldn’t stop thanking the photographer and his “fans” for affording him a life he’d never imagined. Arshad was also admittedly overjoyed by those needling him for a selfie or an interview. He did say his business was briefly disrupted, though his main lament was purely economic: “kaam nahi karenge to raat ko le kar kya jayenge?” In that sense, the photo hasn’t disrupted his life at all, instead, it has given it a new lease.
8. EPF ask a question – how many people would have showed up to meet him had he been a rich man?: This question is best answered by the Khans and Bachchans of Bollywood whose houses are perennially surrounded by banyan-clad idiots who pass for “fans”. In fact, the richer and the more famous the celebrity, the higher are his/her chances of being lynched by a crazy mob.
9. In one of the articles, EPF say there is no such thing as “reverse sexism”, and only females are at receiving end of all gender-based discrimination: Haha, this is nothing but a manifestation of what Bill Burr said, "Women are constantly busy patting themselves on the back for how difficult their lives are, and no man refutes them because they want to fuck them." I am not surprised EPF think this way, because they're the first to go up in arms when told that a lot of attractive women are hired by big companies almost solely for their looks. Need greater examples of reverse sexism? Ask Brian Banks, the athlete who served five years in jail for a rape he didn’t commit, just because everyone found it too easy to believe the accuser since she was a woman. Judicial bias against men is systemic, and goes far beyond crimes against women. There are umpteen other examples of brazen reverse sexism.
It seems that the EPF, by hiding behind the condescending message of "let him do his job", are not too comfortable with the idea of social mobility - an illiterate, non-English speaking chaiwala breaking the ranks to become more influential than their stupid words.
Godspeed, Chaiwale!
It seems that the EPF, by hiding behind the condescending message of "let him do his job", are not too comfortable with the idea of social mobility - an illiterate, non-English speaking chaiwala breaking the ranks to become more influential than their stupid words.
Godspeed, Chaiwale!
