Beyonce, Coldplay angers fans over cultural appropriation

We Indians are a strange lot. We crib when people don’t talk about us. When they do, we want them to talk about us in a certain fashion.

 

I mean what’s wrong with this Beyonce music video or Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire. Don’t we celebrate Holi? Don’t we have sadhus? Beautiful girls bedecked in jewelry? Or is it that we don’t appreciate foreigners dressing in Indian ways.

 

If we take the other, Slumdog Millionaire’s depiction of India – Is there no poverty in India? Poor people struggling to make ends meet? Small kids thrown into begging trade.

 

So what are we telling international media – Don’t show us in a particular light. Don’t stereotype us. Not as snake charmers. Not as a poor, unclean country. Show us how maybe Karan Johar shows foreign locations in his movies – just the goody goody things – great locations, colourful people.

 

But we don’t we have a similar criticism for Anurag Kashyap for his Gangs of Wasseyppur though. I loved the movie despite the questions I keep getting for my birthplace Dhanbad.

 

And think about this as well. Do you think these music videos and movies are the only window foreigners have about India? This is the world of internet my dear. The videos we upload on Youtube and Facebook are there for everyone to see.

 

On other note: Why did Sonam Kapoor decide even to appear in this video? She disappears even before you recognise it is her.