Students, Just Like Everyone Else, Deserve Privacy

Don't have an account?
Just enter your email id or mobile no and create your account in two easy steps!

🇮🇳
- 🇮🇳
- 🇳🇿
LOGIN

I am a
looking for
Country

[{"type":"txt","id":"rich_1501749529533","data":"Here's a fun activity for you to consider: Assuming you have the privilege of having your own room, set up your phone in such a way that the camera covers the door to your room, start recording and then shut the door. <\/p>Chances are your entire family will come barging in the second they hear your door closing. Your grandfather, a happy docile man who has trouble walking from point A to B, will personally kick the door down, send you flying till you hit the wall opposite your door, dislodging the phone you had set up there to record the reaction. Just like a true storm, there is a momentary lapse in the usual noises of the house before it starts, it here being the barrage of questions that are directed at you, the young person of the house, the student who dared to shut their door. \"Why did you shut the door to your room?,\" asks your Mom, and before you can even think of formulating a response, your Dad will ask you, \"Is something wrong? Why did you shut the door! Tell me! Why!? Why!?\"<\/p>If you manage to gather your wits under this barrage of questions and mumble 'I just needed privacy', the sound you'll hear is similar to the one you'll hear right before Daenerys Targaryen's dragons make before they breathe fire. Just that this time the question you'll get is one your parents don't want an answer to but are going to ask anyway, \"Why do you need privacy at your age?\"<\/p>If you managed to record all this, upload the video to YouTube and make some YouTube money, because that is the hottest career right now. <\/p>Yay! So much fun!<\/p>"},{"type":"img","id":"img-uid-1501750335217","data":"5982fc5cadcf8"},{"type":"txt","id":"rich_1501750337307","data":"Privacy at your age: <\/b><\/p>For a country that prides itself on family values and in how close knit its families are, Indian parents are probably the absolute worst when it comes to understanding their children. The son or daughter is never a growing boy or girl, but always a little child that hung around holding the parent's pinky finger when they were about 1. Now I get that, I understand that parents will always care for their children no matter what, but at what point will Indian parents realise that infantilization and snooping on every move their child makes is actually harmful to their development as they're growing up? <\/p>As shocking as it may sound, children grow up to become adults, and between being a child and an adult, there's this painful period called teenage where every other teenager thinks nobody understands them and they're alone in the world, which obviously means you're tearing them apart, parents! This is perhaps the most vulnerable time in a human's development, their teenage will define the kind of person they will become, and I understand that parents are worried about what their children are doing, but I only have one question to ask, especially to the overly concerned parents who don't seem to leave their children alone: If you don't trust your children enough, what makes you think they'll ever confide in you? <\/p>According to my extensive research in magazines about relationships, the most important factor in maintaining a relationship is trust. While earning and placing your trust in someone you choose to marry is one thing, placing your trust in your children is quite another. For one, your children never were asked to be born, they are only on the planet because you chose for them. If anything, they deserve your trust more than anyone else in the world. <\/p>Another fun activity, show the above paragraph to your parents, record their reactions and send them to me if you still have functional limbs. <\/p>I used to think it was only my mother that was incredibly annoying with her fists smashing the door to my room every time I dared shut it, the room that is basically my palace and kingdom in my home, demanding what I was doing. It is incredibly annoying to have your door practically broken every time you shut it when you were a teenager, but now it is both sad and hilarious when mom asks me what I was doing locked up in my room. I won't answer, and she can't make me answer. End of story. <\/p>"},{"type":"img","id":"img-uid-1501752030423","data":"5982fd378e6a7"},{"type":"txt","id":"rich_1501752035126","data":"Privacy is a western import, said the professor, as he stole my phone:  <\/b>  <\/p>\"No sir, that phone is a western import, privacy is a human right,\" I said. I was punished for that. <\/p>The year was 2009, the moment I stepped into Engineering, I knew I hated it. I hated every second I spent in my college, although the college itself was not at fault for this. The buildings don't discriminate, the people in them do. My tongue-in-cheek reply was seen as insubordination and I was to be court-martialed by this mini Kangaroo court in SNIST. My crime? Hurting the professor's ego. <\/p>And thus he took my phone and didn't return it. I was asked to return home and take it at the end of the semester, and not knowing what to do, I just laughed in his face, worsening my already deplorable case. Surely he was kidding, I thought to myself, surely he cannot be this stupid?<\/p>He was.<\/p>At the time, I was dating a someone I had met the previous year, and my phone was filled with our texts. Of course, he read my messages, of course, he mocked me for them. I couldn't protest, asking him to cut it out and not read my private texts just produced a cruel laugh, he knew he was tormenting me and he enjoyed it. Power corrupts, and professors in Engineering colleges are the worst abusers of this fact. <\/p>'There's no word in the Indian languages for privacy', writes Buzzfeed News contributor Aroon Deep, 'that isn\u2019t surprising, considering that unlike many western countries, Indian society is based on communities, not individuals', which is spot on, because Indians are good at one thing, ignoring obvious problems that stare them in the face and pretending everything is okay, as long as it doesn't affect them. Because of this, teenagers are beaten into submission either psychologically or physically, sometimes both, until they are convinced that they do not require privacy. <\/p>I fail to understand why the human decency of keeping your nose out of someone else's business is considered a western import, in fact privacy is considered the sole realm of married couples, everyone else be damned. Of course, married couples being allowed the 'privilege' of privacy is no coincidence, because somehow our parents seem to think that we are still children sucking on our sterilized bottles of milk until the moment we are forced into a marriage with someone you barely even know. It doesn't matter if the marriage will be abusive or not, as long as you're not married, you don't deserve to be an adult, and by extension, you don't deserve privacy. <\/p>Aroon Deep writes it much better than I ever could on his Buzzfeed article, which you can read by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.buzzfeed.com\/aroondeep\/how-indian-kids-raised-without-personal-space-became-adults?utm_term=.tqPrw4wXw#.jeoDLVLBL\">clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>Secret Invasion: <\/b> <\/p>Posting the article mentioned above on my Facebook wall led me to write this piece today. Aroon Deep writes of his horror story with his former school from which he was expelled for some unsavoury comments he made about one of his teachers on private chat (it is called Private Messaging for a reason, you know), the password of his facebook account having been forced out of him when his parents took the school's side, also one of the reasons I wrote so extensively about parents not understanding their children up above. A friend of mine, 17-year old Sarthak Pawar, commented saying that something similar had happened to them in his school. Curious and looking for a story, I asked him what exactly had happened. <\/p>\"We were 13-year olds venting on social media, in a private group,\" Sarthak says over Private Message on Facebook, \"You know how it is, angsty teenagers, venting our frustrations against our teachers. Somehow our teachers got wind of this group and all hell broke loose.\" <\/p>Sarthak's school administration then proceeded to force the children's Facebook passwords out of them using threats and what can only be considered criminal coercion, \"We were warned of all sorts of dire consequences, severe punishments, expulsions. The entire administration was on a power and ego trip.\" <\/p>It isn't surprising to notice that both Aroon and Sarthak's cases shared similar elements of abuse. Both schools had idiots in charge of children, both schools placed their egos ahead of the privacy of the children in their care, both schools threatened expulsion and warned students to stay off social media, something which they have absolutely no authority over. In short, both incidents are a microcosm of what is wrong with our education system, or at least a part of it anyway: educators on a power trip and parents who don't know any better. <\/span><\/p> <\/p>"},{"type":"img","id":"img-uid-1501754628851","data":"5982fcc7e1419"},{"type":"txt","id":"rich_1501754631592","data":"'I Have Nothing To Hide':  <\/b><\/p>Anyone who says they don't really need privacy because they have nothing to hide is a liar or someone with nothing to lose. So unless they're Max Payne, they too need privacy. As Edward Snowden says it, \"Arguing that you don't care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about free speech because you have nothing to say.\" <\/p>I've often found that those who advocate for no privacy laws are also the ones who are unwilling to put out their bank statements and their online banking passwords, and of course, lock their doors and hide their money in lockers when at home. It is a coward's argument, one who would much rather let the government take control of every aspect of their life before realising their mistake. A country where you cannot afford to be who you are in the privacy of your own home, where you cannot afford to use your own data as you see fit, sharing it with those who you want to trust instead of being forced to give it up, where even the government uses silly anecdotes like 'India is a country where in a train journey, strangers tell you their story in five minutes,' to justify having no proper privacy laws, is a country that is on the cusp of losing its privacy laws forever. We, every last one of us, need to stand up and fight for our right to privacy, so we can be who we are without fear. <\/p>I'm appealing to students with this article because nobody knows the pain of being subjected to privacy invading searches than students do. Adults might face the occasional cop that believes his lathi gives him the authority to check your phone, but us single girls and boys, men and women, and everything in between, we are the biggest victims of privacy invasion, and thus we must become the Right to Privacy's biggest supporters. Your fellow students need you.<\/p>"},{"type":"img","id":"img-uid-1501755538797","data":"5982fd2f58509"},{"type":"txt","id":"rich_1501755541446","data":"Judgement Day: <\/b> <\/p>The 9 Judge bench assembled by the Supreme Court to decide upon the Right to Privacy conclude their arguments and discussions today, with a judgement coming soon. A 9 judge bench is extremely rare and has only been assembled in rare cases, therefore it is safe to say that the future of India and its citizens hangs in the balance, with the whole world keeping a close eye on the happenings. Whatever the bench decides, the fight for privacy is far from over, and I don't know about you folks but I'm fighting for it till the end of my days if I need to. <\/p>There is nothing more authoritarians love than a country whose people are willing to turn a blind eye to everything they do. It's not like us Indians are unaware of the lack of personal space, it's just that we are so used to it, it can come off as a shock when people actually point out how bad it actually is. As Aroon Deep puts it, Indian kids who grow up without privacy turn into adults who don't care about privacy. Because they don't know any better, simply put. <\/p>One day, this country will shake off the demons of its past and move on ahead with its values preserved, but also while respecting individual rights. Until that day, however, we will suffer because someone, often someone who has your 'best interests' at heart, will infringe upon your privacy. As a man, nothing infuriates me more, but it also makes me wonder how bad women have it, especially considering how much our society values her virginity instead of the woman herself. <\/p>"}]

Message

Experience the best version of stumagz by getting the app.

Get College News, Updates
at just 5 MB

Complete Form

Experience the best version of stumagz by getting the app.

Get College News, Updates at just 5 MB

Complete Form

Responses

Get College News, Updates
at just 5 MB