It really is the Age of Offence that we are living in right now. Anything and everything offends people. India has become Offendedistan. There were calls for a Tanishq boycott because of two ads – one that spoke about interfaith marriage and more recently another that spoke about celebrating Diwali without crackers. And now there are calls for boycotting Amazon – what is #BoycottAmazon all about?
So apparently the furore was about hurting religious sentiments – because of the depiction of Hindu religious iconography on shorts, underwear, doormats etc. Then there is another listing of a t-shirt that claims to be depicting two goddesses in an amorous pose – this is listed as an LGBTQ t-shirt.
As a result of this and similar posts with images of Amazon product pages, there was a great deal of outrage among the tweeple for ‘hurting Hindu sentiments’. A doormat with the ‘Aum’ symbol on it and underwear with pictures of what appear to be gods and goddesses on them was outrageous and an insult said the tweets. The tweeple called for the pages to be taken down, for Amazon to issue an apology.
I recalled that such controversies have erupted in the past – outrage over merchandise that trivialises religious icons etc. So I decided to actually look for the products that have caused so much offence. This is what I came up with.
I took the words of the product listing “sexy Hindu goddess Kali Sita LGBTQ” and searched for it on Amazon.in. The results consisted of statues, images of gods and goddesses, rudraksha etc. I searched on the American website, Amazon.com, and again found nothing resembling these images.
I then did a Google search with this keyword, and I found this page (see image above) on Amazon. However, t-shirts, sweatshirts etc. with this image are available on another Indian website (they are listed as ‘bestsellers’ and priced between Rs. 1800 and 4100/-).
I also searched for “Hindu God T-shirt” on Amazon.in and this screengrab (below) is what I found. These are the sort of t-shirts that we see worn around us all the time – with a great deal of pride, it must be said. Many of the tweeple also spoke about looking for the listings in the pictures and not finding any. So what exactly are the tweeple outraging about?
Much of the social media outrage we see is manufactured outrage. The brouhaha caused earlier would have ensured that online stores no longer list items that would cause such outrage. However, the fact that something like #BoycottAmazon started to trend at a time when many would be doing their Diwali shopping (more online than offline this year) could be significant. The images also seem to be chosen; those that are most likely to trigger people.
Like it or not, social media trends do influence people’s thoughts and actions. Companies and political parties devote significant resources to starting a deliberate trend on social media --- which may or may not be based on fact. The so-called facts are also frequently taken out of context, twisted, misrepresented as being from an authentic source when it may be no such thing. Or they may be presented as recent whereas they may be years old.
Obviously as regular people on social media we tend not to question trending hashtags – we presume that there has been an occurrence that enough people felt strongly about which resulted in the trend. We tend not to question the source, the timing, the content; particularly if it is outrageous or triggering material of this sort. The fact, however, is that we are being manipulated, our emotions are being manipulated and we are made to think and act in a way that others want us to.
It is difficult to say how and where the #BoycottAmazon hashtag started, however, there is a possibility that this was deliberately started. It could be to further an agenda or it could simply be a marketing gambit – if people are boycotting Amazon, they will obviously want to shop from other stores. Buyers may even be annoyed enough to overlook the fact that buying from00 Amazon means profit for Indian sellers, not just the enrichment of Jeff Bezos.
Perhaps it is time we made some Diwali resolutions this year: such as not believing everything we come across on social media. Such as verifying ‘news’ that we come across; especially if it seems inflammatory or, conversely too good to be true. Such as not forwarding /sharing unverified or fake content.
So the next time you are moved to #BoycottAmazon, make sure it is for real reasons, not for what could well be recycled news, repackaged to trigger fresh outrage.
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