Another day, another outrage, and another FIR against a comedian. Or, in this case, an entire panel of content creators who did what content creators do—make jokes, push the envelope, and sometimes land in hot water.
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The now-infamous episode of India’s Got Latent, featuring Ranveer Allahbadia, Samay Raina, Apoorva Makhija, Jaspreet Singh, and Ashish Chanchlani, has officially been taken down, but not before the internet did what it does best—lose its collective mind.
Let’s be real for a second. This was never meant to be a family-friendly, moral compass-tightening, wisdom-dispensing show. It’s India’s Got Latent, a platform known for its no-holds-barred, say-it-like-it-is brand of humour or whatever people call it these days. And yet, here we are, acting surprised when things got, well… distasteful. People knew exactly what they were signing up for when they clicked on that video, but suddenly, it’s gasp offensive?
And what makes this even funnier (ironically, of course) is that the episode was behind a paywall. An adult creator made a joke on an adult show, for an adult audience—so what, exactly, were people expecting? A TED Talk? Mindfulness meditation? A life-changing discourse on the meaning of existence?
Look, should content creators be mindful of what they put out? Sure. Not every joke needs to punch down, and not everything controversial is automatically funny. But filing FIRs over a comedy show? That’s where things take a turn from “justified criticism” to “unhinged overreaction.”
But the biggest irony? The same country that had no problem with Animal or Kabir Singh - a film that glorified violence and toxic masculinity. Or movies like Dostana which made a mockery of the queer community - is suddenly drawing the line at an offhand remark in a questionable comedy show. Priorities, much?
The selective outrage is truly something. We don’t bat an eyelid when corruption scandals break, when communal tensions flare up, women getting beaten up or violated or when the air quality makes breathing an extreme sport. But one tasteless joke on an already tasteless show? National crisis!
Guwahati Police also registered an FIR against YouTubers, content creators, and influencers including Ashish Chanchlani, Jaspreet Singh, Apoorva Makhija, Ranveer Allahbadia, Samay Raina and others for promoting obscenity and engaging in sexually explicit discussions on India’s Got Latent.
Because, clearly, that’s the biggest problem the city is facing. Never mind the crater-sized potholes swallowing vehicles whole, the traffic snarls that turn daily commutes into survival missions, the encroachment which leaves pedestrians with almost no space to walk on the roads and the footpaths or the alarming rise in crime.
Forget about inflation making basic necessities unaffordable, corruption running unchecked, or politicians busy giving everything a communal spin. Who cares about women’s safety, pollution levels choking the city, or the vanishing green cover? No, the real crisis, apparently, is an offensive joke on an offensive show. Priorities, right?
At the end of the day, the show was exactly what it promised to be - crass, unfiltered, and controversial. Love it, hate it, ignore it—but let’s stop pretending to be shocked. And maybe, just maybe, we could focus our collective rage on issues that actually matter.