Cancel culture || Acharya Prashant (2022)

Acharya Prashant

‍♂️ Want to meet Acharya Prashant? Be a part of the Live Sessions: https://acharyaprashant.org/hi/enquir...   Want to read Acharya Prashant's Books? Get Free Delivery: https://acharyaprashant.org/en/books?...  ~~~~~  Video Information: 19.06.2022, Conversation session, Greater Noida  Context: What is cancel culture, and how would you define it? What are some examples of high-profile instances of cancel culture in recent years? What are the potential benefits and drawbacks of cancel culture? How does cancel culture intersect with freedom of speech and expression? What are the psychological effects on individuals who have been "cancelled"? Is there a difference between holding someone accountable and participating in cancel culture? How do social media platforms contribute to the proliferation of cancel culture? Can cancel culture lead to positive societal change, or does it primarily serve as a form of online vigilantism? Are there ways to address problematic behavior without resorting to cancel culture? What role do apologies and forgiveness play in navigating cancel culture? How does cancel culture impact public figures' careers, reputations, and mental health? Is there a generational divide in attitudes toward cancel culture? Are there cultural or regional differences in how cancel culture manifests or is perceived? How can individuals protect themselves from being unfairly targeted by cancel culture? What are some strategies for promoting accountability and fostering constructive dialogue instead of resorting to cancellation?  Music Credits: Milind Date  ~~~~~

Transcript

00:00How do you balance that work and life and fun relationship together?

00:10You'll have to start from seeing where your time is actually going.

00:19See time is not necessarily purely objective.

00:26There is one thing called the material time that you look at in a chronometer, in a watch.

00:43You could call it the chronological time.

00:46And there is another thing that we experience, time in the head.

00:52As we experience it, time in the head, mental time, psychological time.

01:02Psychological time does not run the same way as material time.

01:12Intervals that are boring to us, distasteful to us, dislikable to us, stretch within.

01:21They are experienced as bigger and more important than they really are.

01:31So for example, I took around one and a half hours coming to your college, I am at Juhu.

01:41But these one and a half hours appeared longer than one and a half, right?

01:49Now if I'm not being very objective about my time, I'll feel as if of my, let's say,

01:5917, 18 waking hours and the 14 odd hours that I have available for work, to and fro commute

02:11has taken away six hours.

02:15Whereas objectively, how much has been expended?

02:21One and a half plus another one and a half.

02:25So that's just three.

02:27But because the Mumbai traffic obviously is not something anybody can relish.

02:34Because you cannot relish it, because every moment feels like a tax, a burden.

02:43So internally this expands to six and that's okay.

02:48That's okay to know that this time is not likable, so it is appearing longer.

02:56But it is a mistake when that internal appearance is transported to outer calculations.

03:06Internally it appeared like six hours.

03:08Now if I take that six hours as an objective figure, as a material reality, then I'll entitle

03:15myself to say, oh, I have all in all 14 hours available to myself in the day.

03:21And out of those 14 hours, six hours have been taken away by the commute.

03:27I'm not deliberately deceiving anybody.

03:32It's just that I am not mindful of the fact that the experiencer shapes the experience.

03:42I do not know that.

03:44The experiencer of three hours can shape them to make them appear like, feel like six hours.

03:53All that is within.

03:54The six hours are within.

03:55Not here.

03:56Here there are only three hours.

04:00But the moment I say, oh, I lost six hours out of 14, I have entitled myself to feel

04:06like a sufferer or a victim.

04:09Not only that, I have licensed myself to say that a huge chunk, 40% of my time is being

04:18needlessly spent on something and I'm helpless in that regard because I can't change my commute

04:23time.

04:24So what do I do if my academic results are not that good or if I do not get time for

04:29my co-curricular activities or time for socializing or time for sports or time for entertainment

04:34and so many other things that a young person wants to have in life.

04:40The thing is, we ought to be objective.

04:45We ought to know where it really is going.

04:48Are we keeping a record?

04:51Try keeping a record.

04:52Try seeing where it actually is going.

04:54And you might find that nobody is actually all that short of time.

05:00Time is there.

05:01It's just that when time is expended in activities that please us, we try to hide that time.

05:11Because it's our little joyful secret.

05:15I spent one hour doing something that is very pleasing, but at the same time, not productive

05:22at all, not useful at all.

05:24There is no creativity in that.

05:26There is just a very average kind of or low kind of pleasure in that.

05:32Will I admit to myself that one hour of my active time, waking time is being taken away

05:39by that activity daily?

05:40No, I'll not admit that.

05:42So that one, objectively, will be reduced to zero internally.

05:50And three hours of commute, objectively, will be blown up to six internally.

05:57So the calculations will go haywire when you put the numbers on the sheet.

06:03If you're not being objective, you're just going by appearances and experiences, you

06:08will feel, oh my God, I'm just a victim.

06:10I'm a poor victim because I'm a Mumbai girl.

06:13And the traffic is so bad and the college timings, they are so oppressive.

06:17What do I do?

06:18I have time for self-development, for co-curriculars and I want to visit libraries and I want to

06:23have a nice little walk on the beach in the evenings and none of that is being possible

06:28because the entire system is just oppressing me.

06:30That's not really the case.

06:33If you will be honest, you will find that significant chunks of your time are being

06:39taken away by activities you do not even want to admit to yourself.

06:44All of us are involved in activities that simply, but silently, surreptitiously, now

06:53at our time, those things are not bold enough and open enough to just come and declare,

07:03yes, we are going to take away two hours of your daily schedule.

07:07They will not declare that because if they will declare that, they will be caught.

07:11You will say, oh, it's so bad.

07:13Two hours spent every day gossiping, chatting or scrawling reels, no, no, no, that's just

07:21too bad.

07:22So what will we do?

07:23We will act to ourselves, we will pretend to ourselves as if that time does not exist

07:31at all.

07:32So those two objective hours will simply be marked as zero within.

07:35No, that didn't happen.

07:36Yes, I went to bed at 11 because, you know, I'm a student, I'm supposed to wake up like

07:416, 7 maximum.

07:42I have to reach the college at what time, 8 time, 8, 9, 8.

07:47So I'm supposed to wake up at 5.30.

07:49So I can leave the home by 6.15 and be here in time.

07:55And how was I feeling in the commute?

07:58Drowsy, energyless, all sapped out, ready to fall over.

08:05The neighbor was trying to be extra careful.

08:08Anytime something can tumble over me.

08:12Why was all that happening?

08:15Because did you really sleep at 11 p.m.?

08:19No.

08:2011 p.m. is when you declare to yourself that you have gone to bed.

08:23Till 1 a.m. in the night, it was Instagram.

08:31Is that not so?

08:32And I'm not saying that offhand.

08:37The usage statistics of social media among the youth very clearly bring out this aspect.

08:48Young people are most active on social media two hours before and two hours after midnight.

08:5710 p.m. to 2 a.m.

09:01That's when young people are running about on social media.

09:07Why don't we talk about that traffic?

09:11There's a lot of traffic there.

09:12Why don't we talk about the traffic there?

09:13You know what happened?

09:15You'd have been in your school at that time and you wouldn't have had a phone available

09:19to you.

09:21When data first started becoming available, I'm talking of a situation 10 years back or

09:28something.

09:31These companies, they came up with plans.

09:35Not that data started becoming available in 2012.

09:38That was 20 years back.

09:40But I'm talking of the plans specifically.

09:42They came up with plans that made data cheaper between 9 p.m. and 3 a.m.

09:53And it worked for them.

09:56They also reduced the calling rates.

10:00So now data is cheaper and calls are cheaper.

10:03And what are all the young people doing?

10:06And I do not really suppose that all that data is being consumed in self-development

10:12and gaining internal illumination.

10:17How do I say that?

10:19When I look at the pages, the profiles, the channels, all these things, the handles on

10:27social media, and I see which ones have the maximum followers, likes, retweets, comments,

10:37what do I find?

10:42The worst quality ones have the maximum traffic.

10:48Pages and profiles and channels that ought to have been starved of any viewership are

10:57the ones frolicking in attention.

11:05They are literally inundated with viewership.

11:16And all that is happening between 10 p.m. and 2 a.m.

11:24That's where the youth of India is spending its time.

11:32First of all, your time is not going into something you would want it to be devoted

11:41to.

11:42Secondly, you are empowering.

11:44I'm not talking about you, please.

11:45I'm talking about the youth of this country in general.

11:49Secondly, you are empowering all kinds of worthless and very mediocre people.

12:01And they are turning into your role models, your celebrities.

12:08It's a double jeopardy.

12:15That which deserves to command your attention is being starved of attention and even viewership

12:21is a market.

12:22If you do not look at it, if you do not look at something, that thing in due course of

12:27time will cease to exist.

12:29You know how the social media engines operate.

12:34If something is not receiving viewer attention, it will no more come up in the search results

12:42or in the notifications or in the various other things.

12:46On the other hand, if something is getting popular, it will get more popular.

12:50It will be shown to more people.

12:52So figure out where your time is really going.

12:59There are things you can do nothing about.

13:02You or I cannot change the traffic situation in Mumbai, right?

13:07But there are things we can do something about.

13:10Let's have a talk of them.

13:13Otherwise, talking of immovables becomes a clever internal ploy to not move even the

13:25movable.

13:28Talking about the unchangeable becomes an excuse to not change even the changeable.

13:38Figure out where your time is and if commuting takes so much time, use that constructively.

13:44I do not know whether the train or bus or personal thing you are using affords you that

13:50kind of convenience, but if you can read, read.

13:53If you cannot read, use earphones or headphone.

13:58Use audio files.

14:00That's the best use of...

14:02There have been people who have educated themselves in the course of their journeys.

14:08There have been people who have written beautiful books in the course of their hospitalization.

14:15So try to make the best use of whatever situation you are in.

14:20I do not know whether this satisfies you, but...

14:28Even in jail, some of the greatest literature from the freedom struggle movement, the Indian

14:37freedom struggle movement, came from the period when our revolutionaries were jailed.

14:45And you know what they said?

14:47They said this is really the only time when we are free to write.

14:52So thank you.

14:53Now that we are incarcerated here, there is nothing else to do.

14:58So we will write.

15:00And they wrote prolific volumes.

15:03Try to make best use.

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