WhatsApp, the demon in disguise.

As the #DeleteFacebook movement subsides, as we got served with some much-needed reality check there might be another hazard lurking in the dark which must be taken out if we are to win our battles. We are talking about none other than our beloved no. 1 trending app in Play Store, WhatsApp. With a whopping 1.3 Billion active users in a month. What’s at stake might not be your privacy but something of equal magnitude. Long gone are the halcyon days when its sole purpose was to connect individuals, it is raging an out war at you and its purpose, take you farther and farther away from your goals. If you are someone who struggles to get the most important tasks in your day checked out or has trouble focusing on something worth your while or is loomed inside negative thoughts and most of your energy is spent in fighting these thoughts and feels like an uphill climb doing it? The solution could lie in revisiting the usage of your phone and especially the supposedly most important app installed on it, WhatsApp.

Never in the wildest dreams would have someone imagined an app would be so widely used even my milkman has found its utility. He drops in a message to every one of his subscribers as a reminder to let know the due date of his service is approaching and we subscribers, in turn, can use the app as a messenger in case a query or grievance needs to be addressed as calling over the phone is considered sinister these days. We all are well aware when it comes to social media and connectivity, more is certainly not merrier. As our phones are bombarded with incessant useless information left, right and centre, a toll is being taken on us on a much deeper level as these messages fight to gain our attention, things that really matters takes a backseat. Our minds have limited information processing power which is getting drained as we go through these “exasperating” messages which has got nothing of value to provide. As we swim across the deluge of group messages and good mornings and jokes, political propaganda and fake science, as we indulge in unending chat sessions and forward sprees are we forgetting the fact that there are much more things for us to achieve than seeing double ticks across our chats and derive mental kicks from dopamine spikes every time our phones light up with the icon of a telephone receiver engulfed in a conversation bubble drenched in green with white outline.

We are a generation of men and women who do not know how to hold an eye to eye conversation but are expert conversationalists should a touchscreen keyboard be provided. All the credits and applauds to who? You guessed it right, our very own hero of the conversation, WhatsApp. I know individuals who abhor the idea of receiving a call and will provide a lecture on time management should the threshold is passed but would happily dedicate hours on a stretch chatting away lighting up the brain providing it with the steady surge of dopamine which it seeks in desperation.

What alarms me is the majority of us are hypnotized by this wonder-app that we do not even realize the adversities and are often passed as a harmless habit. We are hopelessly dependent that we cannot help but give in to the marvels the app has got to offer like a moth getting attracted to candlelight despite knowing it can burn it down but cannot fight the urge and ultimately give in to death. As we fail to fight the demons surrounding us and continue to stay “hooked” to some invention which turned its founders billionaires and made its users a victim of business? Or maybe the blame should go to its own users who abused a tool which was bestowed on us as a blessing. You be the judge.

I cannot help but be amazed as I discern how weak our defence systems are that we traded our promises and oaths we took for ourselves for a screen getting lighted up. Why cannot we fight back? Why cannot we reclaim our lives? Why are we not protesting and letting an invention puppeteer us without putting up any fight? Let us ponder over this for a while. Does it take a catastrophe to mend our ways?

The first step in reclaiming back your life is realizing there needs a change, now that I assume we are already through that phase, what follows is taking action, we do not have much of a choice but to rid ourselves of the app. I can understand your agony of hey, I cannot rid myself of this app as this is the only way to reach my friends. In such a case if getting rid of the app is not an option how about we go through some other options? How about leaving groups which no longer serve you, how about muting the groups which you can’t leave so that the groups are used on your own terms. How about disabling the notifications of the app altogether and limit the no. of visits to 2 times per day. I know it is hard, well guess what, yes it is, it is called a demon for a reason.

Let’s take some effort to reclaim our powers back shall we?

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I am an educated illiterate, are you too? I know most are...

A Belgian friend of mine asked, "Why people in India don't keep their own city clean?". It took me a moment, and I responded. I said "People in India are divided in 3 categories, the literate, illiterate and the educated illiterate. The literates try there best to keep the city clean, illiterate doesn't, and educated illiterate, are literates who have given up being literates and mixing up with majority to become educated illiterate who don't  care to keep the city clean, like the illiterate.

To begin with the meaning of word literate, as per Dictionary.com is as below:

literate

adjective
1. able to read and write.
2. having or showing knowledge of literature, writing, etc.; literary; well-read.
3. characterized by skill, lucidity, polish, or the like: His writing is literate but cold and clinical.
4. having knowledge or skill in a specified field: Is she computer literate? The boss needs a computer‐literate assistant.
5. having an education; educated.

noun
6. a person who can read and write.
7. a learned person.

"A person who can read and write." What did we learn in school or when we were young? I am sure everyone was taught cleanliness, why it is important, etc. Then as a literate we are supposed to keep our cities, streets, surroundings clean. Yes we do keep it clean, but there are other lot of people who simply don't care about cleanliness, and litter everywhere. In the end the literates end up littering too.

Lets assume for instance, you are the one who always comes and follows all traffic rules, but then at one signal/intersection, you see every one jumping the lights, and that happens everyday, and you are the one always stopping to follow the traffic rules, and others are honking at you, abusing you to move. Then comes a day wen you say, "I had enough, who cares about the traffic rules.", and then you too jump the lights. That is how the literates become the educated illiterates. By the way I am sure I will make a post on people who don't follow traffic rules sooner or latter.

So the fact is everyone just ends up littering their cities, and put the country to shame.

Also, have to agree to another fact that we Indians are selfish, we only care about ourselves, at most for their own family, why care for the city or the country?

I know the literate, illiterate stuff is hard to understand, ... who cares?
Who reads this stuff, ... who cares?
Why waste time on the internet, ... who cares?
Why people are dying of hunger, ... who cares?


When will we care ...

The power of religion, differences and the forgotten

One thing you see, when reading daily news, is people getting killed over religion. Then when you think, you will find that religion is the root cause for fighting, hatred, evils among the people. And you start hating the whole idea about religion.

But after I while, I realized, without religion humanity wouldn't have been possible.

Lets think of the early humans, for them living alone or in small groups, would they have ever survived? I feel we would have been extinct by now! Alone, they would have been hunted down by big mammals, or couldn't have survived the harsher environment they lived in. It was only when these smaller groups, became larger that civilization were made. But how do you bring unity, among various individuals in a group, or in a civilization? The answer would be simple, by sharing the same beliefs and ideology. In turn these beliefs and ideology took shape into various religions that we see today. And because of which some great civilizations or empires where made.

But unfortunately its religion, which is ultimately destroying the world today. If you look into history, most civilization which reaches its peak, declines and is gradually forgotten. We are the largest civilization that ever existed, and at its peak, there are so many differences, and it will destroy the world, only to be forgotten again.

Now I get Ice cream at home!

Never wanted this to be my first blog post. But sometimes there are things that just makes you feel, its not right to be quiet, and its time to bring the feelings out. It did come out often, but was mostly buried within, and now its time to make a change.

Delhi often gets a lots of rape cases, and once in a while these would become a huge news, depending on how it happened, and how media puts it in-front. And the recent case of a women working with a finance company being raped while being driven home in hired taxi from a reputed company. Its commendable effort that the Police was able to arrests the offender, but the steps taken by the government seems all politically motivated, or out of frustration, so they just banned the taxi service, and plan to do so for other such service, rather then working towards the real issue. If it were to happen, then read below.

Here is a short story of a girl named 'Strawberry'.

Everyone liked Strawberry. She was very friendly, helpful and sweet!
One day when Strawberry was coming back home, late from work she hired a taxi.
She gets a ice cream in the taxi, so, the government bans all the taxi's!
Life moves on, and she starts travelling in bus.
But she also gets ice cream in the bus, so the government bans all the buses!
Life moves on, and she then starts travelling in metro.
But she also gets ice cream in the metro, so the government bans all the metro's!
Life moves on, and she feels its better to go home walking.
But she even gets ice cream when walking too, so the government bans all from walking!
Now that Strawberry couldn't go out anywhere, she finally said,
"Now I get ice cream at home!"

PS: replace 'ice cream' with word 'raped'.