What started off as a harmless joke punning on the Malayali accent, ended up dividing a women-only Facebook group with over 50,000 members around the world—The Urban Tribals. Even after the group admins repeatedly posted apologies, the Kochi-based women collective, a sub group of The Urban Tribals on WhatsApp, who had taken offence were not ready to back down. Sub groups of the The Urban Tribals evolved when members met up in their respective cities. The important question that arises here is—are Malayali’s so insecure and thin-skinned not to take a joke in their stride? The Kochi Post tries to understand the situation by speaking to both parties on what really happened following that post.
On August 10, someone posted the joke on the Malayali accent on The Urban Tribals—a group started with the vision to build a marketing platform for women to buy Indian silver and imitation jewellery. Besides marketing jewellery, the group allows posting of personal problems, beauty care solutions, jokes and other knick-knacks. One member took umbrage at the joke and what followed was a war of words with one of the administrators—Priti Patel. Instead of diffusing the situation, the administrator Priti Patel in an abusive retort asked all Malayalis to leave the group or else, they would be thrown out.
This led to an outburst by many a Malayali woman in the group asking for an apology from Priti as it was unacceptable for an admin of the group to use abusive language on a reputed platform. “The joke was taken as a joke only”, states a representative from the Kochi-based women’s collective, the sub group of The Urban Tribals, Binzy K H, a freelance consultant and a blogger. “The uproar is against the racist comment made by Priti and not the joke,” she emphasises and adds, “I understand a Malayali lady abused Priti and that triggered her post and it was not directed towards anyone in particular. It was against all of us, filled with abuses and racist comments, which is highly unacceptable and condemnable.”
The other admins of the group did a live video chat soon after the uproar by the group members and apologised on Priti’s behalf. Ammu Narayanan, a Kochi-based entrepreneur and a member of the collective adds, “We demand a respectful apology to the racist comments. From all the posts so far, it appears that the apology is for posting of the joke when we have no issue with the joke. Most of us also took it in a lighter vein. We want the admins to do a live video on the issue and talk about the racist comments made by Priti. It’s about the racism and inequality that was spread in the group.”
The Kochi Post tried to contact Priti Patel but she did not respond while the founder of the group Dr Atraeyee Niharchandra points out, “I was unaware of the post by Priti till I got personal messages from other members. I immediately had a word with her and also did a live chat on the group. We have now banned jokes in the group as I have seen people getting offended by them. Priti did apologise on the comments section of the live video. I don’t understand why the issue is getting blown out of proportion now.”
Atraeyee also seeks answers from the Malayali’s ladies questioning the group and its integrity, even after they had come online and condemned the post by Priti. “I had an argument with Priti the minute I got to know about the post. We also ensured that she does minimal activity in the group. One must understand that it was her personal views and the group does not support it in any way.”
But why rake up the issue after a gap of 10 days? Binzy says, “During that time, some of us were affected by the recent floods in the state and many of us were helping in the relief activity. The issue could have been resolved that day itself, if Ms Patel had apologised and was immediately removed as an admin. Instead, soon after the live session by the admins on behalf of Ms Patel, many of us who questioned the post and its language were either removed from the group or blocked from commenting on it. This is one of the main reasons for our collective outburst.”
Adding to it, Binzy shares, “They are posting messages in the group as if I have a personal vendetta against Priti instead of understanding that I am a representative of a collective of 15-20 women, who want a sincere apology from Priti for the post.”
As the post by Binzy and others went viral on social media, Priti deleted her Facebook account and was also removed from The Urban Tribals group. She shared a WhatsApp apology with one of its members but the Kochi collective wants an apology on the group. “We want a public apology from her because she should understand the gravitas of the issue,” explains Priya Thankappan, another member.
The Kochi-based women’s group was planning to take the matter to the next level by reporting the incident to Facebook and even planning to complain to cyber security. Binzy states,“We want to keep this as the last option. We want them to understand when you are managing a group of 50,000 people, one needs to be cautious about the language you use on social media when one is the administrator.”
Post Script: Priti Patel has since been removed as the admin of The Urban Tribals and the Kochi based collective has dropped the plan to report the matter.
