Sometimes I wonder whether Bollywood influences the thinking of public or public behavor influences Bollywood.
Earlier movies used to show love between rich and poor. For the two lovers achieving their love used to be ultimate goal of the life. The commitment used to be default part of the love. Physical relation before marriage used to be taken as mistake of the life.
Now the trend is changing, people love each other but they are not ready for commitment, especially according to Bollywood movies males hesitate to give commitment. They don’t understand that they are in love. Physical relation before marriage is very common thing. I guess India is still not ready to accept girl getting into relation without commitment from her side. As of now in all movies like ‘Hum Tum’, ‘Love Aaj Kal’, ‘Paa’, ‘Salam Namaste’ females are portrayed to be committed.
Females are becoming independent economically and emotionally that could be the reason of this change. But I don’t understand changed behavior of guys of hesitating for commitment or they not realizing they loving someone. Why don’t they get ready to take responsibility? Somebody please help me out here to understand.
I won’t wonder if I get to see single females, single mothers living proud life. I wont wonder to see many divorcees. I wont wonder to see single fathers. I won’t wonder if concepts like ‘single woman man’ or ‘single man woman’ no longer exist in reality.
Don’t know the change is good or bad. But change is inevitable.
10 comments:
HUMMM...i think society is changing..and Bollywood is capturing it. We indians always follow americans....with education and internet, the world has become smaller. We are more exposed to the western ideas than before. in the past most of the Indians knew only one culture.. and that was Indian.. and we thought that's how things are supposed to be.. and they followed the pattern. Now they know other ways of living, which are liberal. Commitment is a responsibility, and also considerable limitations, and adjustments. relationships without commitment, is advantages of marriage without any responsibilities and compromises. Sounds way better to guys. And we Indians who are fascinated by the western culture (mostly because of the their wealth and white skin) still think, western is superior. Whether its their McDonald's, or Wall-mart, or their way of living. One thing we don't learn from them is respecting each other and each other's space. We are in between somewhere.. Dhobi ka kuttaaa... and so it's a mess....
hmmmmm agree with you. When I meet people of 24-25, my brain stops functioning to know their fundas about life. This is the scene in metro cities wondering whats happening in rest of India. I guess things are changing everywhere. Where internet is not popular Bollywood is doing the needful :-)
That seems to be the influence of western culture. Here live-in relationships are very common. In fact, they are so surprised that our families search our life partners. They believe in spending time with their partner before committing into a relationship / marriage. Having sex on the 3rd or 4th date is a common custom here. The reason they do not prefer to get married early is that if after a few years, they feel that they are not made for each other, they call it off without the guy having to pay alimony to the girl. Of course, the girl ends up as a single mother at times, which is harsh and incorrect. Guys only wanna get physical pleasure, but not endure responsibility.
My 2 cents - Human mind always looks for opportunities to escape. Man is indeed biologically engineered to seek as many mates as possible in order to spread his genes. Woman is engineered to nuture and bring up her children and hence commitment comes to her more naturally. I believe indian men are no less restless today then earlier, however, in earlier times, society was strict, and they didn't have the choice to openly flaunt their attitude. In that sense, yes western culture has shown us, that you can have freedom. And finally, we are prone to generalization, but to be fair, men are born in all shades just like women, and plenty of men are more committed than women. In US, there is a deep divide between liberal and conservative ppl. The latter marry early, have kids, believe in family values...and are not like the wild lost souls potrayed in movies.
I will disagree with your statement "Now the trend is changing, people love each other but they are not ready for commitment, especially according to Bollywood movies males
hesitate to give commitment". I think I have said this before and I will say it again. Love is a tripod, which requires all its 3 legs standing firm. Lust, Intimacy & Commitment. Its no love if any one of these three legs are missing. So, if there is no commitment, its no love. So, if a man is not committed, then lets not mistaken it for love. Every relationship between a man and a woman is not necessarily love.
I think we are looking at the picture a little out of its context. We need to understand that no one enters in a relationship already committed. We tend to abuse the word 'Love' by overusing it. Understand that love is a process. Any damn, silly stupid relationship should not be termed as love. You cannot just getup one day and decide, fine I am getting into one relationship here and so I will have to be committed. A person, man or woman gets into a relationship with the wish/desire/want/need to fall in love. The relationship will mature in different ways. Sometime its just platonic , sometime its casual dating, sometimes its physical. But, every human runs through this process with an eventual goal to find love. And its not a law, that one should find love in every relationship he or she gets involved in.
And you said it right, men tend to take time to realize their love. Its because men are more committed to finding love. They will not commit into something with a half cooked heart. For a woman it might take 2 days to say that she is in love. Thats the way women are, but a man requires his time to believe that the relationship he is in is what he is been waiting his whole life. The woman he is with, is the one he wants to grow old with. I think both men and women are correct with their respective thoughts. Thats why, men are men and women are women.
Nice thoughtful blog. The trend is indeed changing. Thanks to our education system and westernization. From our childhood we are taught to compete and not co-exist. Parents want their children to be indenpendent and stand on their legs. We are moving away from joint families and so from the socio-cultural way of living. So naturally our mindset are also changing. Recently I heard a management funda about growing competition "you have to keep running to stay where you are". Junk.
The result of indenpendency is this so-called LOVE before marriage. People prefer love marriage nowadays because they expect specific attributes or characteristics from their spouse. "How can we ever marriage someone whom we dont know anything about?"!! Does this sound familier? Where was this in the previous generations? Now please dont start off with male chauvinist society etc etc. When we start expecting specifics, and by time if they are not met, we just cant adapt to the change. We would rather prefer living individually. Thats exactly what we are seeing now.
To me, all these is crap. Ofcourse there are exceptions (like Prashant:-)). I feel life should be filled with surprises. If everything happens as we think, then the essense of life is lost. Common, life is not a piece of software to plan, design and execute. But we need to keep in mind the boundaries (principles/dharma).
Coming to bollywood, yes, some aspects of it are reflections of life and the trend. But the intensity of the change in trend has increased because of some of the movies. People in film industry seem to have forgotton that they have a social responsibility and it is a powerful media and not limited to mere 2 hours of entertainment.
Regarding committment, your writeup seem to sympathize females. I dont blame you because thats what we see in front-end. But males too are committed to the relationship (No raised eyebrows please. I am still enjoying my bachelorhood). Both males and females are equally responsible for what is happening. Infact, generally, males are more dependent and are in need of a companion more than female.
[Sorry for a long comment. I didnt know where to stop ;-)]
- Rajeev
I am on the same page as Kunal on the definition of Love. being a tripod!and though we in india still dotn accept it in the open , lust and intimacy is a big chunk of that relationship.Irrespective of the gender,i think it a relationship involves stakes from both the sides for similar reasons.The era is changing,earlier guys cud be more outspoken abt their sexual libido .. but times are changing rapidly.. and there is bound to be the turn of table where women voice out in the open the same discontent.Incompatibility in the physical terms will well be in the foreground in divorce cases in modern times..the west is already seeing it..they have renounced their roots.. its a matter of time wen the generations in our countries also follow suit renouncing their customs n social insecurities.Man is a social animal but what will he behave like when the society itself undergoes a wave of change..HE wud eventually follow suit.Love is surreal .. its about care , concern,understandings,sweet nothings what make u smile.. its the same between good friends, between cousins, bonded siblings,between any two individuals respecting each other enuf to be in each others company.Its about being COMFORTABLE.
In a relationship between a Man and Women seeking love for marriage,lust and intimacy is the driving force... but the others just need to be in place.Young people try to woo each other pretending what they are not.. so everything is hunky dory and then the ugliness starts popping up and the relationship dives to dirt.Love will lead to committment when two people dating satrt accepting the ugliness as well ..it will reach the goal wehn they are honestly comfortable with each other in any of the shit circumstances.and for this to happen both need to be together, not relenting to social pressures.Love happens over time..
So i feel Women and Men both are essentially walking on the same line and there will be time when women will think exactly like men ..The only reason that makes them a little paranoid is the rapid ticking away of their biological clock and the social n peer pressures of peering eyes which raise a brow for the word ' single' .. There will a change in times such that Men will be waiting for the commitment from the women jus the same way .Its all the same..cos women are breaking borders that differentiated them as Women and Man in the social guidelines. Chnage is inevitable.. n its jus round the corner.
There are few topics here:
Physical relations before marriage in bollywood films : it used to be there in old days movies. But there was no concept of single mother, either she will marry to someone else or get rid of baby or abortion. Now a day’s also later two are heavily used options but first one is also being used. I liked Vidya’s mom in paa, the way she handled the situation is too good. That does not imply that I agree to concept of single mother. These kind of situation gives rise to the unbalance society and like western cultures. The most impacted will be children’s like oro in Paa, and or Amitab bachhan in some movie (Laawaris).. where rakhi was his mother .. again concept of single mother seems concept is not new but again coming up. Only difference is society is changing, and accepting the concept. Susmita sen is bold example of the changing society, which is another topic of discussion.
Committed relationship : Well this is new word in India dictionary, as previously something like divorce did not exist, these things have come to India from external influences. As we have opened up to the world more, we are trying to follow them without giving second thought. Kings used to have many queens and similarly queens in the older time used to have some one to entertain them, but these things were not used to happen openly and not known to society. In current time guys are still same and they are always looking for something new every time, they don’t want to commit relationship as per them that will take away their freedom and bind to a relation or stop them from achieve material targets. But as the girls are achieving the independence in all directions for many of them relationship is fun for them or way to enjoy life exactly like guys, may not true for all girls but still this is true.
Dipa
the change is bad, and more bad is that it is inevitable, unless v hv d guts to leave our mnc jobs, go back to villages and live a india of gandhiji's vision. i also cant do that, sorry.
my first so long comments.. apologies but being in USA, i am in a totally new world and wish to share my feelings....I agree with most of the stuff but change is always there for good and bad... when we follow western culture there people live their life... they do not sacrifice their most of time for kids. They work at fix hours, leave their kids to day care so this leads to no love in parents and children... kids try to find good friends in society than home... so this is same trend coming in here... so in one way its good that you have time for yourself but at the latter part of life you are alone since your kids are gone to do what they want to do in life.. also in terms of independence, today’s kids are more independent, decisions makers so they are moving to entrepreneur spirits and moving out rather then sticking to so called Jobs (service industry) so this is both for good and bad.. I came to USA about 6 months back and here the stand is that people do their own work... first getting some one to work for you is costly, second people have lot of time for them selves to take care of stuff them selves to be busy.. I see people coming to office at 7 Am and get over with day at 4 pm... Have dinner at 4-6 pm... 6 pm is actually quite late for these guys and then they go out with friend to party and have good time until 10 pm to work for their leisure... they are dong exactly what we Indians use to do in past.. By sunset have dinner. Sleep early and get up early to work... so some how we are laid back now and these guys took good things in life... my new year resolution is to get up early... sleep early.. But then its with family... kids and people at home are bored when we are working in office so they sleep in evening and by the time you are dead, they will be on high and expect a family time... so things at times work and at time do not work…assuming its an off for your kids, they will get up late by 10- 11 am but you are already spent your half hard working day in office so at times we also have to master work life balance so that they both go hand in hand.. overall I will say we Indians are still far far better then anyone in terms of love and affection that we generally have for our near ones.. Here people travel to their parents once in an year or two and that too planned and near Christmas... whereas as are still blessed to be with our parent most of the time (still time is changing and I have many friends who have not met their parents in last 5 years and talk once in a week and they are mostly here in USA)… long live and India and Indian culture.. The only thing we need to do it to respect it as we did in our history
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