Hate worshipers are always quick to
take to any new innovation to spread their agenda. The rise of the internet and
digital era were thought to curb the irrationalists but they found heightened
grounds in the form of cyber racism. Each forward giant step of humanity in the
scientific realm was countered by retrograde phenomenon of utilising the same
development for racism, bigotry and ethnic cleansing. Hate mails were the
latest of the lot until the new avatars in the form of Facebook and the like
took center stage. The new entrant in this league is WhatsApp, a very
convenient application aiding in easy transference of text, audio and video
across the globe. According to new data WhatsApp is considered as THE
application revolutionizing communication and will soon replace Facebook in
utility and popularity. It’s this very user friendliness that can result in
detriment.
Recently I received a WhatsApp
picture message of a man, with bricks wound around his waist, brandishing a
machine gun. The text alongside explained him as a Palestinian who believes in
protecting his scrotum above anything as he has to beget as many progeny as he
can to counter the loss in the war zone! It’s soon identified as a deliberate hate
message with the intention of maligning one section of the community through
innuendos. Similarly the fanatic right wing alongside similar such groups is
also engaged in churning out misleading and dangerous such messages and the
gullible as usual is all ready to gulp it down without remorse. The instant
tendency to forward the same to groups and pals is irresistible meeting with
dire consequences and it’ll be too late by the time the rejoinder for the same
is circulated. By then no one will be interested and a new ‘doctored’ message
would have taken center stage.
Photoshop, a wonderful tool,
becomes the villain in all these cases pointing to the abject misuse of
technology to extremely abysmal and derogatory purposes. The so called educated
lot are instant to take to such messages without any forethought of the
consequences as they merely want to ‘break news’. Then the plight of the
uninitiated can be guessed! WhatsApp emerges as a weapon powerful than a
nuclear bomb to decimate a population. Using the simple options of ‘choose and
forward’ it unleashes consequences with unfathomable results.
The new cyberlaw might address this
problem but there’s no point in taking action once the damage is done. A better
option is to upgrade the existing app with an option to screen the contents for
doctoring prior its posting. The same picture/video can be then posted with a
script alongside that the above data is Photoshopped/doctored with a particular
software/tool. This can instantly take the wind out of such hate sails and at
the same time the question of freedom of expression is also saved. Communication
and fun have higher purposes than causing war!
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