 Hello and let's talk about Raul Tevatia's innings in the IPL. The 27-year-old's world win innings of 53 in 31 balls helped his team Rajasthan Royals chase a very tough target of 224 in the IPL match held yesterday against Kings XI Punjab. What was even more interesting was the fact that he struggled initially, taking 23 balls to hit his first 17 runs, before unleashing five sixes in one over, a record held so far by Chris Gale. His heroics are now being celebrated but during the first part of his innings he was being massively trolled with even commentators taking his case. Of course once the turnaround happened he was the man of the moment. These ups and downs in social media and by commentators are a sign of the times maybe, how quickly and prematurely we respond to issues even before the time is right. Now sports is one of the disciplines where we get to see this the most but politics, entertainment, these fields are not immune either. We talked to news clicks Leslie Xavier on social media experts in the pitfalls of this culture. Thank you Leslie for joining us. So yesterday's match was quieter. The word is what a world-win match for lack of better words. Lots of ups and downs of course and Raul Tehwatiya's performance has been rightly praised. One of the interesting things is that how which you were mentioning as well is how commentary responses drastically shifted during the course of that very short innings. It was even a very long innings or a test match for that matter. And so how do you see, could you just take us through the ups and downs and maybe what it kind of says about fandom itself in today's sport, especially cricket? It's actually not just the fans it was also the experts who were giving commentary live during the match. So Tehwatiya of course he was under pressure. He came after his skipper caught out and they were chasing a huge target against against 11 Punjab. And so he started off, I mean he was nervous, visibly nervous and even his captain Steve Smith after the match he said that we could see from the dugout that the only thing that is bothering him was his nervousness. Otherwise they were all confident about his capabilities. And so he took 19 balls to in fact middle the ball that way. And that's a I mean that's considered as seen in T20 because it's a 20 overmatch and if you I mean use the best part of 20 balls for getting set, I mean it's considered as seen. But also cricket is a game which which which has various styles of how a batsman carries himself through the inning. And yesterday's I mean not exactly a direct comparison here but yesterday's inning was reminiscent of one Mr. Emma Stoney who made a career out of doing things like this where he would base himself initially get himself hit and then just explode when when it was necessary and when he would close the match he would be placing as a great finisher. But then Emma Stoney's early part of his career compared to what we have now. The nature of fans nature of cricket following nature of cricket commonly nature of how fans engage through the match has changed. And that was evident yesterday when initially the idea was blasted ripped apart in on social media on Twitter. Even the commentators joined the bandwagon that is a recent phenomena that I've been noticing where the commentators themselves experts the former players themselves say things which which are capable of becoming viral. So some of them were commenting saying that maybe they should always wicket because he's obviously having trouble batting. And so for the for the larger course of the team, maybe he should get a get himself out so that other people can come in and play the match. And then the same commentators later in the match when they exploded and when he ensured that this side one they started praising him saying that that's a brilliant turn around. He played really well. This is latter half of his. So the whole episode which played out yesterday, it's beyond that sports fandom and our sports fans behave. It's also indicative of how things are at present as far as social media social media commentary and everything is concerned. So we have a lot of experts on social media experts who hardly understand what exactly is happening on the playing field in the society on the political realm in any any matter for for that environment. Any any matter you take everybody as an opinion, and they find it safe and convenient to express that opinion opinion explicitly aggressively on social media. And without even realizing what exactly they're talking about or whether they are right or wrong, that kind of accountability is lacking on social media. And it's so I'm taking I've taken back to younger days when our parents or our elders in the house or even our teachers, they used to tell us that what we speak or what we express is very important because we can take it back to always have and also the accountability that's something that's been drilled into our system. At a younger stage or in our format, you are saying that we have to be accountable for our actions for what you say. I mean, before our actions, obviously what we say because these are things that we can take back this will affect our ability in the longer run. This would hurt people this would I mean, all these things are gone out of the window suddenly. And initially, we thought that this is so we used to have these kind of discussions where I mean, we ourselves in the on the news click sports desk have been trolled many times by fans of different groups when we are critical about their team or their player. When we are critical about Virat Kohli, a lot of Indian cricket fans come down. When we were cricket recently critical about the ISL and football club from Calcutta, their fans came in. So and so we initially used to talk about being an active place suddenly and how it's it's it's not exactly a conducive environment for free thinking for free expression, because people just join in and attack. But then when we look at the larger picture, it seems to have seeped into real life as well, because accountability and where the responsibly behaving or responsibility talking or responsibility expressing our opinion with credibility with with nuance is lacking across the board everywhere. So that is, that is a that is a that is a commentary that I would like to make observing what happened so many miles down in the on the West in in the Middle East in aggregate on aggregate. Right. So this context is interesting, because one of the aspects is also how you've talked about this as well, how this is seeped into media as well. And we saw some of this in the controversy around Sunil Gawaskar's comments last week. But also in many other areas where we see that the instant gratification slash virality model of social media is now influencing all social discussions around sports around social issues in general. Yeah, so Sunil Gawaskar's is recently in the in the sports field. Before that, if you look at it, I mean, the most raging issue in the country at the moment is Sushant Singh Rajput's death and we are Chakraborty's and generally Bollywood's usage of substances. Of course, there are a lot of other issues that is happening across the country, but that badly matters when this is viral. And so it's a it's a self serving nexus to ask me. So there are Western Western interest in making something viral or making it not I mean, not viral. So we have had various reports, various theories as well as reports on how the social media channels, they, they can push certain ideas, ideologies or content based on based on their business model based on based on the economics that they work on and or their Western interests in general. And that is one aspect of this. The other aspect is the instant gratification that you mentioned, because everybody gets into the band, bandwagon for two different reasons. One would be to not to miss out on the traffic and the potential revenue that it has, because it's all about pranking your website or your channel that you are involved. So it's a highly cut throat world over there. So if some news gets viral somewhere, the other news channels or other other websites would want to get into it and not miss out of it, regardless of whether it's right or not. The chain of command is, is involved in it. It's also having so it's in larger news rooms, how it works is very, very tricky because the at the lower run, where people are involved in publishing or involved in pushing these stories, the viral stories, the social media based stories, they are expected to bring in the numbers. At the same time, editorial calls are not not exactly their forte. So by the time these stories are out, and the numbers come in, then even even in the higher ranks, whether editors sit or where the people who can take a call on whether this is editorial right or wrong, they just don't get involved in it. Because at a larger scale, the purpose has been to the numbers are coming in. So that that it has a cascading effect. And it's just tied up in this kind of a spiral that it's, I don't know how the media escape would come out of this, this whole setup. It's going to be very difficult in that regard. And as far as topics are concerned, as individuals, how we react to certain, certain things. The classic example being last week, Sunil Gawaskar issue. So there were many and Gawaskar's greatness is beyond doubt in cricket history. And he mentioned something, which, I mean, as a, as a, as an observer, I feel that he was referring to Virat Kohli's another viral video where he was playing cricket with Anushka Sharma on the on his, in his house premises. And Anushka was calling to Virat and they were batting. I mean, he was batting. So he just casually mentioned that it was probably, I mean, so where is the sense of humor that we are supposed to have that is one question. The second question is on Twitter, on social media across people started going after Sunil Gawaskar saying that who are you questioning his credentials, questioning his sense, his sensibilities, and also even physically threatening him also, like we should break your face and all that. And these people, I don't know where they come from, what their background is in cricket or understanding of cricket or history is, but you are talking to a person who used to play helmetless against the fastest bowlers in the world, who is to come from West Indies at that point with no restriction, they used to bounce you out. I mean, they don't need your wicket, they will just ensure that you are walking, I mean, you're stretched out of the field and used to play and he has four double sensibilities facing these kinds of bowlers without an helmet. So and, and you're talking about breaking his face. So it's, I mean, the absurdity of such statements, statements that you see online just makes us wonder where what we have become as, as a society as in this at this point in time and at this point in history. And is there a going back from here? That's also another question because our lives are and more so during lockdown now, our lives are completely intrinsically entrenched in online systems. We ourselves are talking via zoom. And our this video would come out on on IGTV on YouTube channel, it would be pushed via social media. So it's, it's, it's a reality that the online space and the real life space is more or less one now. So it's, it's about time that we as a society and take a stand saying that we should have some kind of all those unwritten guidelines that we used to live by earlier that what I mentioned earlier about speak, right, speak before speaking, all these things should apply now on online and the social media behavior, because it's, it's, it's our life now. It's, and that's, and our life individually means that it will affect the entire society as well. So that's, that's the, that's the problem that these instances and yeah, IPL it's entertainment, it's a cricket match. It's this boy, he 27 year old journeyman, he's made a mark now is probably will have a great season. He would probably this would open doors to a larger, much more better career. Everything is great. And we're talking about game as such. And we also talk that as professional athletes, these guys should now learn to cope with such pressure, such criticism and all that maybe he does too, because the first thing that he said was that those 20 balls were the worst balls of my career. That's not a, that's not confidence if you ask me, that's not how he should have addressed that he should have said, if you ask me, but he's also probably scared of what the repercussions would be when he says that I don't care about the 20 balls look I scored and I made the team win. But that, I mean, you never know how, how these social media warriors would, would take that and come up. So that's, that's, that's the reality for you. Right. And that way, on the one hand, a lot where when say the social media era began, one of the promises was, of course, that common people would have the ability to participate in various ways in all these aspects in sport and politics that was considered one of the promise promises of social media per se. And there have been examples of that happening also in good ways where it whether it be popular culture, whether it be sport, social social media presence and social media fandom as hell. But what you said is very accurate in the sense that we're talking about a sports person who was successful yesterday. But suppose he had failed the amount of the avalanche of criticism that would have come his way would put could have put his career back considerably, even he's a technically skilled player, of course. But for all, you know, it could have been disastrous for his career. So yeah, these things affect individuals, you know, because whatever it's spoken and I mean, expressed on social media, and people who throw these words, they probably won't realize it. And I mean, I could speak from my experience when I was told once for the story. And, and this was a relentless attack, probably a concerted attack by a fight to the fan groups of of more than one club. Because I was critical of the club and one of their previous actions. And they just I mean, six, seven hours, I mean, I reacted a little, probably I shouldn't have and six, seven hours of continuous thing. And then it started affecting me. It's because you just brings you down your when it raises your blood pressure, perhaps, and you just keep constantly dragged into it so much so that your work gets affected through the day you're so this is just me and we are not superstars, we are just journalists, common people and we are not governed by social media personas or we don't we don't even care what what these strangers think about but but when you are a sports star, when you're a celebrity, when you are when you are in the public sphere, these things these things matter because a public persona and public how you carry yourself outside, it's very much important and part of this as a sports person's career. And so when if at all, I failed yesterday, I failed to see his team team to yesterday, the storm on social media would would have been so much that probably the team management, whatever the internal planning and dynamic for this boy is through this season, they might have been forced to rethink their strategy. That's the power that that social media and and these these channels they have on on on how things things things work on on the playing field so on the sports field and this this is sports we are talking about. The same thing applies to qualities they're saying I mean, you know how the ruling this position controls media control social media the the famed or or infamous IT cell, which which pushes content pushes pushes ideas. So these, I mean, it's it's having yeah, I'm catching my head. It's, I don't know where this where this is going to lead. It's it's an evolving process. So when you mentioned that when the social media entire system started entire ecosystem started, the latter part of last decade. And the promise was, of course, I mean, world getting smaller, you getting in touch with people getting to understand what other people are doing. And then I feel that gradually down the road. So Twitter when we got into Twitter initially, everybody says looks back the initial Twitter at least they look back saying that it was such a happy place. So much of interactions. So much of positive interaction. So much of exchange of ideas. Then slowly news happened. But that so that was also fine. You get news through Twitter. And then suddenly things changed. I don't know whether I mean, you can't directly, I mean, it's a it's a mix of a lot of factors, you can't directly correlate it by saying that, of course, that is also a factor, a big factor. Capitalism happened in on social media. It's a big factor because money started getting into it. So these guys realized, for instance, Facebook realized that they could make money by ensuring some content is pushed and some content is not. So that happened. And on the other side, freedom and liberty we talk about, right? And there is this, I mean, one of the basic, I mean, the founding tenets of liberty is that it should be exercised with responsibility. So that was, I mean, that those kind of rules are missing on social media. It's like a wild world out there. So this is an evolutionary process for sure, because everywhere society, whenever or civilizations, whenever it has been formed, these kind of evolutionary things have happened on in the in the real world. And historically, when we look back at it, and now in history, the real world is is virtual that way, it's a mix of everything. And maybe it will take some years for it to clear itself and get those ideas right. Maybe it might take generations as well. And the way things are, things are progressing, it is, it is going to take a huge turmoil first, and then then everything would clear. I guess that I guess in history, we are heading towards that kind of, I mean, I don't know whether I'm going ahead a little and calling it. But I think it would be a revolution. It needs a revolution for things to things to be reigned in and settled in absolutely. And we get our bearings right. Thank you so much, Leslie, for talking to us. That's all your time for today. We'll be back tomorrow with more news from the country and the world. Until then, keep watching news click.