Thread & Thoughts

🕊 The Timeless Art of Being a Useful Idiot History has a funny way of repeating itself — mostly because there’s always a fresh batch of people eager to play the part of useful idiots . Take 1938, for example. Europe was on edge, Hitler was throwing tantrums, and Britain and France thought they could calm him down with a little “peace offering.” So they handed him Sudetenland on a silver platter, patted themselves on the back, and declared “peace in our time.” Hitler, of course, took one look at this generosity and thought — “What a lovely bunch of fools. I’ll help myself to the rest now.” A year later, he stormed into Poland, and boom — World War II. Fast forward to today. The script hasn’t changed, only the actors have. We’ve got our modern useful idiots — activists who bravely demand ceasefires and world peace from democratic nations (you know, the ones who’ll actually listen), while completely ignoring the missile-happy terrorists on the other side. These heroes of WiFi-z...

Somewhere in a cozy café in South Calcutta, a bespectacled Banerjee stirs her lebu cha while lamenting the state of India’s democracy. Between quotes from Arundhati Roy and Instagram reels from protests she didn’t attend, she assures her followers that she “stands in solidarity.” Meanwhile, her domestic help hasn’t had a Sunday off in three years or salary hike in five years.  This isn’t just a Bengali story—it’s a pan-Indian epidemic: the rise of the Performative Urban Liberal From Zamindari to Zoominars Many of these liberals descend from families that once benefited from land ownership, caste hierarchies, or colonial proximity. Yesterday's zamindars are today’s TEDx speakers. The surnames may change—Mukherjee in Kolkata, Iyer in Chennai, Nair in Kochi, Mehta in Mumbai, Sharma in Delhi—but the playbook remains the same. Their activism is tidy. It has fonts, filters, and fundraising . But most importantly, it has distance —from the people it claims to fight for. Their ancestors b...