In support of mediocracy

It is with great sadness that i accept that being ordinary is not acceptable any more. Every sphere of society demands something novel, distinct and original. I would even say that there is an unhealthy obsession with originality. Don’t get me wrong i am not supporting plagiarism.



So the fodder for this thought stems from a conversation with my superior while discussing appraisal. I got a response that baffled me, he expects something from our team, but he does not know how to put it across. Its like the stupid client requirements, they don’t know what they want, but they want us to hurry up.



With a smirk he added “You work just like others, there must be something original which i would like to see, as you see we reward those employees who mix efficiency with creativity”. I wanted to say, “How about we trade positions, you do the debugging while i will monitor your work sipping coffee”.

Even marx would turn in his grave.



I feel such incompetent incumbents suffer from X-factor. A phrase which i feel is pejorative, borrowed from reality shows. Whenever the judges couldn't rate the lowlifes called contestants, they attribute it to the lack of X-factor. What are they Catholics? One of the other things that irk me about creativity is the ABOUT ME section on social forums. It gives lingual delinquents, mostly hippy teenagers and wanna- be’s a space to express them selves. Where they scribble some hieroglyphics like “ mA AtTtiTuDe Is mA StYlE” kind of one liner. Such people should get their knuckles crushed for abusing the kings’ language. Articulation has surely hit a low point. All in the name of being hip and new wave, I fear.



I realized that this is the deal with everything around me, from advertisement products to relationships. “Something different”, “an aberration from ennui” and being “creative” were the constant sales pitch. Some soul searching would tell you that you would want to escape from your inborn clutches of life, our fears and do something *different; *the disease to be different is within us. A voice in your head asks you not to become another brick in the wall.



So basically what the world around me says is, Be different and be yourself. But buy our products and think the way we want you think. Talk about being novel and rich at the same time!



The only thing that you cannot lie about is dog food ~ Anonymous



Every other entity which wishes to be successful claims that it is different or there is something novel about it.Take a look at the advertisements most of them are about the same products which are already exist in the market.Their product does the same thing that others do in a same way. But there is a catch, they are different.I mean how many different toothpastes, shampoo's and biscuits could we possibly need. Do you really feel that the technical "experts" that they show in the backdrop working for the quality look that attractive.



Even reality shows like NEWS, political rallies, romantic vows and other pro-testerestrone related activities are obsessed over this quality. Fancy terms are juxtaposed; flash programmed and highlighted all to grab COMMON man’s attention.



Being different, unique, novel (insert another modern euphemism if you will) is one of the most abused qualities ever. One takes offence in being called trite or ordinary. We protest against the B [B for bollywood] grade movie producers who churn out movies of the same genre. The truth is that “Novelty is just a myth”, if that wasn’t the case annu malik, SEL would be thrown into pits, Rajkumar santoshi would never dare make another silky-silky-milky-milky movie on the lines of AAA. People wouldn’t vote for politicians who did the same thing, in the pretext of a new excuse .People would not believe in marriage and refuse to reconcile despite knowing that it is the single largest contributor for depression in adults and so on.



It disgusts me that society flirts with success and novelty in the same breath. And many would say that not being different is one of the reasons why one was edged out of the market. I want to shout out loud that, novelty is a quality that is attributed [accepted] only AFTER the commodity is successful. Not the other way around. I could name a million products in which novelty and intelligence were the cardinal ingredients, but ended up in the bin.



If every one says they are different, what are they different from?



But that is a utopian thought and i am not a schizophrenic. Not yet.