A Good Morning to CringeReclaiming Cringe: Good Morning Messages Why are good morning messages cringe, when affirmations, pop astrology, and manifestation culture are not? By Rohitha Naraharisetty
A Gender BenderZahad and Ziya’s Child Can Change How We Talk About Gender In India The Indian media’s focus on the "secrecy” around the gender of the baby misses the memo on how gender works By Akankshya Bahinipaty
Trigger UnhappyWords Mean Things: ‘Trigger’ In all the debate around the utility of trigger warnings, we've rarely paused to examine what we name as triggers. By Rohitha Naraharisetty
Object of All My DesiresThe Feminist Debate: Is Being Objectified Disempowering? The feminist debate on being objectified isn't settled yet -- sometimes, consensual sexual agency can't be separated from objectification. By Rohitha Naraharisetty
Sex and SensibilityThe Media Is Oversexed. Accurate Asexual Representation Can Fix That When it comes to popular culture, it’s not just ace representation that’s needed. It’s a reckoning with sex itself. By Rohitha Naraharisetty
Foxy NewsHow Julia Fox Disrupts Female Celebrity Nobody really knows what she does -- but that's now part of the intrigue rather than the joke. By Rohitha Naraharisetty
Consuming the ConsumersHow Streaming Turned Art into Content, and People into Consumers Streaming failed in its promise, leaving consumers with less agency, ownership, and power over the media they engage with. By Rohitha Naraharisetty
The Fame Monster Under the BedAllegations of Inappropriate Conduct at Nickelodeon Raises Debate on Banning Child Acting Child actors are vulnerable to systemic harassment, abuse, and a suppression of their individuality at a crucial time, leading many to ask whether show biz should even be legal for children anymore. By Rohitha Naraharisetty
Privileging JusticeHow Privilege Discourse Can Distort Social Justice With many discussing how Anne Frank had white privilege and 'Jojo Rabbit' was anti-Semitic, talking about privilege has never been more fraught. By Rohitha Naraharisetty
Crashing the HypeThe Crypto Crash Shows How Hype Fuels Dangerous Trends A combination of the hype business model and the internet birthed crypto -- and led to its downfall when the hype bubble burst. By Rohitha Naraharisetty
Trial By MemeThe Johnny Depp‑Amber Heard Trial Bolstered Meme Pages as the New Mass Media In no other significant event have meme pages intervened as much to actively drive the narrative and shape public opinion; sparking a concerning trend. By Rohitha Naraharisetty
Cat TruceThe Buzz Cut: Women Actors Defy Expectations by Being Friendly to One Another This week in The Buzz Cut, two women defy scientific odds with their friendship and Hollywood learns casting from Bollywood. By Rohitha Naraharisetty
Bigotry ChannelNews Body Directs Aaj Tak To Remove Tablighi Jamaat Content 1 Year After Damage Is Done Islamophobia perpetuated by organizations like Aaj Tak led to violence and discrimination against Muslims during the first wave of Covid19. By Aditi Murti
Breaking NowPeople’s Trust in News Grew Globally During Covid19 but Remained Low in India: Survey While trust in legacy papers remained the same, respondents felt that TV news was more polarizing and brought down their overall trust in the news. By Rohitha Naraharisetty
Let Dissent Breathe“It’s Time We Define Limits of Sedition” To Protect Media Freedom: SC The court refused to allow any coercive action against two Telugu news channels noting the FIRs were a way to “muzzle media freedom.” By Rohitha Naraharisetty
N For NostalgiaCan’t Let Go: Of the Authenticity of ‘Those Pricey Thakur Girls,’ Despite Its Patriarchal Undertones Even though the lead character saves the world to get a man's attention, the book remains a charming, comforting account of an evolving India in the 1980s. By Saumya Kalia
Ground ReportIndia Has Lost At Least 62 Journalists to Covid19 in the Last Year Worldwide, at least 1,063 media persons have died from Covid19 since 1 March 2020, a Swiss analysis shows. By Saumya Kalia
Turn The NarrativeLeaked Report Shows Government Color‑Coded Journalists Based on Political Sympathies The report also contains a detailed strategy on how to spin media narratives. By Saumya Kalia