Democracy in Tinseltown | Gulal Salil

I love how every four years, American elections take the centerstage in world politics, one incompetent racist politician flings accusations at another racist politician, media debates on who’s lesser of the two evils for Prez, and bombs continue to drop on lesser known parts of the world killing two kids walking to the grocery story with their football.

What’s more interesting is that every four years, you see a new left-field politician from the states getting exposed as yet another genocide supporter. AOC is the newest star in the latest flick. America, the state which supplies arms to I$real — arms which kill people and children in Kashmir and Gaza, has stilted itself as the eternal media plutocracy in the guise of a global democracy. One which shall speak for the people of the globe, of the people on the globe, by the people of America.

In Nagaland, a Naga pan shop owner watches Kamala Harris welcoming Tim Walz to the stage on his phone. The church bells ring of patriarchal duty in the background, taking with the wind, the so-called “animistic tribal” mind which perhaps saw gender as fluid before pronouns came about, and before Jesus got etched as his saviour. Kids walk back home from school, while in the far distance, two men wearing green army gear with complex rifles in their hands stand against sterile concrete walls guarding New Delhi’s fragile ego, in Kohima, which is closer to Burma than it is to the NCR.

Reminds me of a story my friend from Kohima told me about how parents would discipline their children in Nagaland up until the 2000s. Or perhaps they still do. They would often use the fear of the army. “The Indian Army will come,” they’d say to the kids, and the kids would scurry off back into their homes. In 1960, the Punjab regiment of the Indian Army rounded up all the menfolk from Matikhrü village, 160 kms from Kohima, and chopped their heads off. More than 300 lives full of consciousness.

America is great at shootings. Schools, camera, action. Self-defence, cameras, action. Assassinations, cameras, action. Democracy, cameras, action. The most “lethal” democracy in the world, it has taught the entire world how to admire guns. It has made it impossible to crack open this impossible-to-master idea called democracy without talking about the US of A all the time on international media.

In Madhya Pradesh, the rape of a caste-marginalised minor a few hundred kilometres from capital city Bhopal goes unreported. Much of unreported Bhopal still remains drowned & mutated in the gas travesty of 1984. In Manipur, the government deploys police at petrol pumps amid fuel shortages. In Gaza, 2 million Palestinians are forced into a 40 km2 radius. That’s two Delhi International Airports for you at 20.66 km2.

The empire never lets the sun set on itself. Hollywood comes out with a kosher Godzilla every two years. Nolan apologises for being white every few years through his cinema where shame consumes heroes like billionaire Batman and scientific-patriot Oppenheimer. A new Iron Man suit comes out in toy stores. New Avatars, each time. America is made great again.

Been feeling so good lately, seeing a half-brown American on my feeds, voicing for change, gunning for change, fighting for change. The Brahmin NRI living inside of me is really excited.

Three years ago, the Bajrang Dal was rooting for Trump in India.

PM Modi shook hands with Trump who was gunning for change, voicing for change, fighting for change. In the light of Jesus as saviour, and Ram as nobility, the American messiah bestows upon us, world democracy—the stage where everyone goes to set but only some get set to win, time and again. Orange to orange. Brown to brown. That’s how it goes in Tinseltown.

Gulal Salil (they/them) is a graphic artist and visual anthropologist from Bhopal, currently based out of Goa.