Recently, actor Abhay Deol urged “woke Indian celebrities” to support the #BlackLivesMatter movement by talking about issues within the country #MigrantLivesMatter. He also raised questions on their fairness cream endorsements.
Similar points have been raised by Kangana Ranaut on selective activism and silence on local issues. In an interview with BBC World News, she reiterated this by saying,
“I feel it has become fancy to somehow be a part of this bandwagon which is relevant to the West. But if you see how Asian celebrities and actors work, they are very impactful in this part of the country. I don’t know how they are participating in the socio-political reform of America. Just a few weeks ago, two sages were killed openly in a mob, they were lynched to death. There was not a word from anyone.”
She added,
“When you politicize your compassion, your activism, your humanity, then you are also a part of the problem. The problem is selective compassion and I think that is what we are seeing here in India.”
“We should take a lead from them and we should talk about our issues because every country has their own set of issues and we need to first deal within the house before we go out and try and reform the world. We are failing to do that.”
Speaking on how industry bigwigs lend their name to whitening products she asked,
“These people, especially the Indian celebrities, the successful ones, certainly I am the exception, they have been endorsing all kinds of fairness products and today shamelessly they stand and say black lives matter.”
“How dare they? Why is no one asking them? What about these million-dollar deals that they have been doing with all kinds of fairness products and how come now suddenly black lives matter?”
Check out the full interview here:
Do you agree with Kangana? Tell us.