COMMENT: A globalised world —Aliya Anjum

Absorbing culture from Hollywood is an insane notion, yet it is happening the world over. Movies depict life in a 90 to180 minute sequence. Real life is nowhere close to reel life. The pop culture heavily marketed to the youth for the creation of a hedonistic consumer society is lethal for any society

Urban teenagers in any part of the world seem identical with Jeans, T-shirts, McDonalds and MTV. From New York to Madrid to Istanbul to Singapore to Karachi, the urbane youth looks alike. In Pakistan, the teenyboppers of today speak an Anglicised Urdu and are unable to pronounce certain Urdu alphabets, thanks to an overdose of Bollywood from the eastern side.

Languages are being influenced by dominant cultures. The whole world has caught on to English slang through Hollywood, Moroccan Arabic is infused with neighbouring Spain’s Spanish and in Pakistan mellifluous Urdu vocabulary is being substituted by crude Hindi terms. Sonia Gandhi had claimed in the early 1990s of having culturally invaded Pakistan. She was quite right. As the Indian media makes it a point to infuse more Sanskrit words and street lingo into Hindi — substituting Urdu vocabulary — Pakistan eagerly laps up Hindi lingo. At the pioneering Karachi Literature Festival, I was surprised to hear a renowned Urdu poetess recite a poetic composition, which could be more appropriately termed a Hindi poem. Flag followed trade in olden days and now culture follows economics, so where would our culture be in the next decade?

Viewing the US from a tourist perspective or worse still from the prism of Hollywood makes it look like a Utopian land. The US does offer many amazing and incomparable opportunities that are unrivalled anywhere in the world. The biggest strengths of the US are its spirit of enterprise, superior ethics, a sense of fairness and an attitude of racial integration. The cleanliness of the country and their sense of order built through the school system are inconceivable in Pakistan. However, the media communicates the vices and not the virtues of the US.

Absorbing culture from Hollywood is an insane notion, yet it is happening the world over. Movies depict life in a 90 to180 minute sequence. Real life is nowhere close to reel life. The pop culture heavily marketed to the youth for the creation of a hedonistic consumer society is lethal for any society. Millionaire kleptomaniac or substance abuse offender Hollywood celebrities scream of psychological issues. There is nothing glamorous about real life hedonism.

McDonalds represents the epitome of processed food. The documentary film ‘Food Inc.’ is a real life horror movie that relates incredible harm experienced in food chains owing to corporate control. Serious animal cruelty is meted out on poultry farms, hormones injected in chickens makes them grow fast hampering their ability to walk as young bones cannot support the enormous weight gained prematurely. Chemicals and preservatives are added in the meat and the final product delivered to the customer is chemical-intensive, resulting in obesity and heart disease.

Corporate-sponsored, consumption-oriented media programming comes at a heavy price. Seven-year-olds wish to dress like Britney Spears, tweens and teens act like adults. Puberty in the cold climate of the US amongst girls has now begun to hit the age of seven thanks to soft porn marketed through television. It comes as no surprise to see animated movie ‘Ice age’ with distinct male and female characters and a prehistoric mammoth struggling with relationship issues. The result, of course, is adolescent and teenage girls battling body image, suffering from relationship woes and teen pregnancies.

Adult independence also means isolation. Nursing home patients in the US suffer from dementia — trauma-induced forgetfulness — and thus cannot seek medical help for their aches and pains, being unable to relate their medical history to the doctor. Attending one Muslim Indian Americans’ meeting, I was stunned to hear how the visits of either spouse’s parents were being tolerated as day-care expense savers. One advertisement marketed a product aimed at senior citizens with the phrase: “Don’t experience a nasty fall at home and lie helpless at the same spot for days, get help through this product.” To my utter amazement, this eerie tagline strangely enthused even middle-aged couples. The Pakistani youth of today risks being the generation that would find itself in nursing homes once old age hits.

Even for the young and active, low morality picked up from the media breeds crime, especially crimes against single women living alone, who make for easy targets. Rape statistics and incidence is appallingly high in the US — a country much touted as conducive to independent living for women. Depression is a common occurrence, so much so that even pets contract it from their owners. A friend’s cousin, a 25-year old fitness enthusiast, consumed an energy drink after a tough workout session and it proved lethal. Living on his own, his death went unnoticed for a week till a friend visited.

Extended family and community plays a vital role in one’s life no matter how much one despises the meddling in one’s affairs by gossipy aunties. The biggest victims of a broken marriage are the children involved. Divorce brings its own baggage and starting life all over again takes its toll on the emotional well being of people. Even within intact families, consumerism leads to parenting in absentia. When mothers take up demanding careers to support a certain lifestyle, the result is neglected children.

The fallout of consumerism in US — pursued as a policy objective after the Second World War — has been pernicious for society. Americanisation, or globalisation, being communicated to Pakistan is only about corporations — a kiss of death for the host culture.

The writer is an academic and can be reached at aliya1924@gmail.com