If we don’t believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don’t believe in it at all. –Noam Chomsky

When I was in the ninth standard, I created a superhero called Destroyer of Troubles and affectionately called him DoT. The details are fuzzy now but I really liked him. I dropped the idea following the events of this past week. Turns out there already is a DoT. And mighty particular about trouble too. DoT wants no trouble. DoT wouldn’t even consider the possibility of it. Trouble is, DoT also defines trouble. And that’s where the trouble starts.

I was never good at math. I still wake up in the middle of the night sometimes after nightmares involving my many math tests. But perhaps advocating Maharashtra government’s decision to make mathematics optional after standard 8 for the reasons above will make me look vain. So I will seek some more educated answers.

The average high-school goer in India is a curious mix of conflicting ambitions. He even likes (gasp!) school sometimes. This is because most of the horror stories he was told as a pre-schooler about schools being torture houses and teachers being demons (who spreads these things I wonder) have proven themselves wrong by this time. He has favourite subjects (sometimes one of them is even math), and many a time nurses fond dreams of making a career out of them.

This is embarrasing. Just as I was making waves with my exceptional storytelling skills, I had to be stung by the old bug. Blogging about blogging. But I will console myself by reminding myself that everyone does this once in a while. Also, my modest observations here are fuelled by a certain amount of frustration with the need to define my medium, my blog, my pajama. Also as a response to Vinu’s post. Even though it is not a straight answer, here goes…

“I’ve noticed this thing about people who try and change the world. The world turns around and changes them right back.” — Batman in JLA Super Special, Gotham Comics, 2003

One little doubt I have about sting operations or anything else of their nature is the original inspiration. Was Operation Duryodhan the brainchild of people who were approached by those corrupt mortals we always manage to choose as our representatives in the Parliament? Or was it the engineers of sting operations who came up with the idea of paying them to ask questions in the House? Perhaps they thought bringing out the fallibility of human nature every now and then is a healthy thing to do?

We cannot, said Pritish Nandy with all due respect to the court, have an entire nation sitting in front of the TV watching Cartoon Network. Oh. Hmm… Er… May I ask why? Cartoon Network is not bad. Not all that bad anyway. As Dumbledore would put it, “There are worse things.”

Mr. Nandy was talking about the telecast of U and U/A cetificate movies being banned from Mumbai television. There must be a lot of people who would have reason to agree with this decree. I do not doubt their reasons. What with all the uncomfortable groping around for the remote control when the actors suddenly decide to do what they shouldn’t do in front of your grandmother. I understand. I really do.

There is something unsettling about the news we see. Why is it all in red? NDTV has for long painted the screen scarlet, but then Aaj Tak went red and Times Now too and also CNN IBN.

Is the reason the traditional Indian one? That of not being gutsy enough to stray from what everyone else has been doing? (Damn, I generalised again. Sorry!) Or is red supposed to be a more newsie colour? I don’t know. It certainly puts me off. I would like to see at least one channel doing it with neat and clean shades (black text on white would be good, even the newsflashes and the tickers are red for God’s sake!).