Team-BHP - Humiliating portrayal of stammerers in Hindi movie

Hi,

Some of you must have seen promos of a forthcoming Hindi movie – Golmal 3 YouTube - Golmaal 3 [dialogue promo] These promos portray stutterers in a very bad light, like they are dim-wits of people with less intelligence.

I consider myself quite thick-skinned and am not usually offended. But this was plain tasteless and offensive. I would be very uncomfortable if I watch it with my kids. What they will think about me?

These kind of trashy movies aren’t my scene and I haven’t seen any movies from this director; but my wife told me that this director has a history of making fun of people’s handicaps. In his earlier movies, he had used a blind couple and a guy who cannot speak as props.

We cannot let this go on forever. Somewhere we will have to take a stand, and put a stop to this kind of crap. I am a founder trustee of an NGO - The Indian Stammering Association (Welcome to The Indian Stammering Association) and we are filing a petition to stay the release of this movie.

Other than this we are also running an online petition against it. Please read and sign the petition and forward it to your friends/family/colleagues. We need as many signature as we can to make an impact.

Petition - Humiliating portrayal of a person who stammers in Golmal 3 Petition

Regards

Nitin

I completely agree with you, all the previous releases of this movie were crap, in this they have gone a step forward and even copied scenes from "Wild Hogs - 2007", no creativity, just copy and paste to make those laugh who might not have seen the original movie which is actually hilarious.

@ntomer,

Now that you have pointed it out, I can certainly understand your outrage.

I must confess that, till now, I had found those scenes funny. May be because stammering is not considered as a handicap, as much as blindness or other pronounced physical handicaps and people do take liberty with such jokes.

But, I agree that it is completely tasteless and inappropriate to make use of any handicap as butt of joke. I am signing your petition.

Quote:

Originally Posted by RX135 (Post 2120086)

@ntomer,

Now that you have pointed it out, I can certainly understand your outrage.
But, I agree that it is completely tasteless and inappropriate to make use of any handicap as butt of joke. I am signing your petition.

@ntomer,

+1 to what RX135 has said. I have signed the petition.

Saw "jhoota hi sahi" where John Abraham starts stammerring just for the heck of it to woo a girl. Real bad taste. Funny part is the girl falls for this saying stammering is cute. God knows what size is the director's brain?:Frustrati

Not just stammering, bollywood tries to make fun any every disabled person. Even people from different communities are stereotyped in the name of entertainment.
I made this post long time back
http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/1121335-post17.html

I feel the reason for this is culture, or popular Indian culture. People pay money to laugh at jokes directed at differently abled people.

In real life also, people with any disability are made to run pillar to post, and majority of govt buildings do not even have access for wheelchairs etc.,

So do not blame the movie, blame your countrymen, who think people with any sort of disability, whether its speech, mind or physical need to be in zoos rather than the society.

Of course many may feel offended by generalized statements, but remember, people on this forum along with their peers and colleagues etc., constitute around .001% of the sample size of India population, and are nowhere qualified to be considered a majority.

So see majority please go watch the movie and see people enjoy and laugh at such portrayal

Quote:

Originally Posted by ghodlur (Post 2120097)

@God knows what size is the director's brain?:Frustrati

Much bigger, figuratively speaking, than many of us. After all he knows how to milk the audience..

Quote:

Originally Posted by tsk1979 (Post 2120129)

Yes TSK, you are right. And that is what we are trying to change.

You can't imagine what effect such things have on an impressionable mind. I have been in touch with many children who stutter and they are scared of such movies etc, because they inevitably result in their friends making fun of them.

Nitin

By and large we Indians have a very poorly developed sense of humour. We seem fundamentally unable to laugh at ourselves or join in a good joke where we ourselves may be the "butt" of the said joke.

We also react much more easily to "slapstick" elements of humour including community stereotyping, others disabilities and discomfiture etc, which are typically some of the popular techniques that our Hindi/ Regional/ Vernacular Films capitalize on.

This kind of thing comprises what passes for "humour" in a large number of such films. Another irritant is the excessive over-acting/ over-reacting that one is subjected to in most Hindi/ Regional/ Vernacular films.

I don't think it either cool or in good taste to make people laugh by using someone elses inherent disability/ disadvantage. I think it is a sign of an innately un-developed or under-developed sense of maturity and perspective.

But it can only be changed over time and with better education reaching a greater mass of our people.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wolfheart (Post 2120380)

Signing petitions is only going to generate more attention and publicity towards the movie. Ignoring it would be the right thing to do.

If the film or any part of it offends you write directly to the filmmaker or to the relevant statutory authority. (eg Censor Board)

Dear Sir,

I don't believe that writing to filmmaker will make any difference. Regarding publicity, all publicity isn't good publicity.

And on the other hand, because of this campaign, a few educated people, like you, might refrain from seeing movie after you know what does it stand for.

Nitin