Storm in a teacup

For those who follow Tamil YouTube news channels names like Madhan, Madhesh, Kishore Swamy, Rajavel, Ayyappan and Savuku would’ve been quite familiar. Couple of days back, in his newly opened YouTube channel, Madhan had unleashed a string of videos that were sting operations conducted by him on the others mentioned in this list, that has literally set the social news media network on fire. The entire summary of those sting operations was about targeting TN BJP leader and his allakais along with taking revenge on those who spoke ill of him and chased him away from limelight. Revenge is the primary intent behind those operations and looking at the number of hits garnered by those videos within hours, suffice to say Madhan has achieved his intent Magna cum laude. Single handedly he has brought the entire new influencers and their network to its knees and the impacted parties are clueless now for a response. Some of them, who were under the garb of holier than thou, using it to add credibility to their comments are now left naked in open. In fact, their own claim to fame have mostly been on whistleblowing misdeeds of others which made interesting content for the followers of their channels. Now that the tables have turned, makes one wonder what their next course of action would be. It is like pig’s war, where each of them is throwing muck at each other, the difference being its Madhan’s turn now. Having been forced into media hibernation for last 2 years, he had spent the time sharpening his axe and has unleashed his videos, secretly taken via the sting operations. The best part is, not even one of them are of any surprise for common people who just follow these channels for timepass. The vanity of those caught in the operation and the perpetrator is there for all to see, where they have always taken a higher pedestal for themselves, mocking those who got caught in controversy. Instead of sharing news as news, they projected them as public opinions. Their agenda driven approach has led to their own downfall and the higher they flew, the dramatic the fall has been. It would be interesting to see how this group responds and in the coming days, who sponsored this hit operation, what were their intent, and all the dirty linen would be out in public too. But the fact of the matter is, like several other stings that happened prior to this one, it goes on to prove that with corporatization of everything in democracy, the system as it is has lost its relevance. Do we’ve a viable alternative? I don’t think so. But for those who have been expressing “shock” in seeing these videos, they are only to be blamed for being so naïve. When political parties legalize electoral bonds as legitimate fund collecting option, why shouldn’t media houses and individual “influencers” follow suit? Above all, how many who watch these channels actually go and vote is a 1.5 billion headcount related question. One thing is sure. The videos would give any hit Reality show a run for its TRP money.

As a result of this absolutely explosive sting operation, the immediate outcome favors those in power. By blowing the whistle on all the whistleblowers, the iota of faith that people might've had on the content coming from non-mainstream sources has been blown out of water. And importantly any other source, who may've a grievance that was aired via these vents have been blocked for the immediate future. People may have short memory but for the foreseeable future no one will trust any "honest" or "nandunilai" media person.

Irony of the whole incident being, to destroy the trust or image of those who fell prey to these sting operation, the trust of the victims on the person who invited them to those meet led to their downfall. News is no longer called as news but as content and these people are not journalists but content creators. By portraying journalism as a holy cow and journalists as sanctimonious, any mistake done by them end up in crucification. These guys thrived on the media spotlight on them all this while and the same light has been magnified to burn them to dust.