Shobhaa De wrong about Indian Olympians; sexist attack on Twitter not right too

Shobhaa De earned Twitter's ire for a careless comment that sent our "national pride" hurtling towards nowhere. With the following tweet, Shobhaa De, more or less, established herself as the queen of gaffes, a "fliperal" [portmanteau of flippant liberal], who spends too much time worrying about "Kate Middleton's derriere" when not shooting herself in the foot by passing unnecessary judgements on our hardworking athletes with Olympic dreams.

But that storm in a tweet-cup notwithstanding, and despite the very well deserved counter comments from almost every sportsperson that India can boast of, what she received was the good old mix of outregeous sexism and misogyny packaged as nationalist pride.

Also read: On a day of heartbreak at Olympics, Shobhaa De's tweet was just cruel

Sample Abhijeet Bhattacharjee's gem of a response at De's salacious tweet:

Naturally, this provoked some response, particularly from the ever vocal Sonam Kapoor, who too had been a target of online trolling from bhakts.

Prompt response from "Abhijeet singer", dipped in his characteristic crassness, as always.

Of course, Abhijeet Bhattacharjee was not alone. An entire army was unleashed on "anti-nationals" such as De.

It is heartbreaking that in India, we must stoop to conquer, particularly exposing an ugly side wherein "teaching a lesson" to those we don't agree with boils down to rampant sexism, communalism, bigotry and misogyny.

"Teaching a lesson" online is our national pastime, whether it's Shobhaa De or Sonam Kapoor at the receiving end, and whether it's a well thought out criticism of the present government or a snide remark dipped in snobbery.

Also read: We want our Bollywood actresses hot and mute: Is that it?

However, occasionally, there's that gentle chiding, full of wit and elegance.

Perhaps all is not lost?