Last night, I watched this documentary Kai the hatchet-wielding hitchhiker. The very term ‘hatchet-wielding’ and that too preceding hitchhiker was enough to paint a dark picture. The documentary, however, is worth your time. In a single sentence, it’s a journey of an unstable person from an overnight YouTube star to a convicted murderer. But in its subtility, it’s also about how far we have come as a society of misguided beliefs and our diminishing standards of acceptance.

Technology has changed our lives in every possible way in past few decades. The trajectory upwards has been very steep – thanks to rapid growth in fields of Electronics and Information Technology. We, as humans, have evolved in great measures when it comes to communication and its medium. From prehistoric humans using hand gestures, facial expressions, painting in caves to modern humans using letters, newspapers, telegrams, phone calls, text messages and lately social media. It’s really been astonishing and a great deal that in just last few hundred years we could make such a huge leap. This have been a great enabler to our societies where passing information has never been easier, quicker or cheaper. Today, any news or content literally travels with speed of light. You can pass personal information at lightning speed, even a very small and local news can reach to millions and billions of audiences across the world within minutes. A billion users can watch a video that was shot in one’s backyard with a small phone. Content creation and distribution has never been easier. Thanks to technological growth, reach and speed of information has increased exponentially. No wonder it played a larger role in recent revolutions like Arab spring.

However, there is more to it than meet the eyes. We have learnt the very hard way that information and the media that propagates it, controls some serious power and in wrong and immature hands, it can wreak havoc. We have been fighting many direct and indirect wars for ages where the exclusive control of narrative and propaganda were major tool of the trade. When we dive deeper into understanding the cause and effects of Nazi propaganda, it has some striking similarity with attempts of some recent religions to control the narrative and how it impacted the society. Good or bad, information indeed has a very important role to play in the contemporary society.

In the documentary, it becomes very hard to remain objective. There is this homeless individual who travels around hitchhiking, doing weeds and living a nomadic life. He tries to save the victim by violently hitting the accused. The gory details and excitement with which he explained the event in the interview was more than indicative of his mental status. What’s surprising is that just before violently hitting the accused, he was travelling with him, chatting casually and sharing weed (as mentioned in the documentary).

Now there was this chain of events which is really concerning. Cleary, there was this lack of moral filter amongst the people who tried to benefit from this unfortunate and mad event, by posting it publicly. History is full of myopic people spreading madness and taking instant and tangible benefits from it. They do not have any respect for the cultural or social evolution that built the moral fabric over a period of millennia. They often forget that it’s this fabric which separated us from animals and eventually led to more stable human societies. It was apparent in this case as well. The worst part is people often get swayed by the raw information like these which are presented to the audience as an attempt to remain unbiased and fair.

At the time, it was one of the most viewed contents and it made that unstable individual an overnight star. The sympathy towards him was phenomenal. His fan following grew so much that one of the leading late night talk shows hosted him on national television. It was a perfect mix of a social cause and violence, and it is a great recipe to pull the crowds. The problem with nude violence is that it draws attention. We can leave the inherent psychiatric reasonings to the psychologists. But often when so called “social cause” is removed from the context, the reality shows the shallowness and fragility of human character. But no one cares to put that effort because it requires a certain level of intellect and most importantly an unbiased willingness. As for as magnetism of violence is concerned, the colosseum of Rome that hosted gladiator fights, existed for a reason. Even today, the “gladiators” of WWE, fake-bleed to keep the audiences engaged.

Three months later when he was convicted for murder, it was extraordinary that people were still divided. Logical reasonings and court’s decision aside, millions of people were not ready to accept it. They were hellbent to demonize the victim and sympathize with the accused. Now notice the pattern here:

1. Millions of people readily accepted the hatcher-wielding hitchhiker a hero despite knowing the fact that the only contribution of the homeless and violent addict towards the society was to save a woman (allegedly) from a man with whom just moments ago he was having his adult conversations and sharing weeds. Just remove the so called “saving of women” from the context. The mechanical nature and lack of any compassion to an inhuman level is apparent. But still people readily diminished their standards to find a hero in him.
2. Individuals of such nature, if not taken care of clinically, are crisis in waiting. All the fame just added fuel to that and eventually a 72-year-old had to pay the price. The worst part is some people were ready to demonize the victim but not ready to accept that their so called hero was at fault.

There lies the question for all of us. Who was at wrong?

1. The homeless and violent addict who was accidentally made a hero.
2. The shortsighted people who used this vulgar event and their resources to get the tangible benefits.
3. The audience that is so desperate to find hero in others that they can lower their standards pretty low and astonishingly stick to it even in the light of evidences.

*(Opinion presented is in personal capacity.)