Is the Pakistani man 'hot' because he's a chaiwala?
What made millions across the world go gaga over a Pakistani tea vendor’s photo that #chaiwala was the top trending item in Pakistan, India, and even in London? Was it his deep-blue eyes, his cheekbones, his moustache, his stubble, the Pathani suit he was wearing or his intense gaze?
Or was it the elitism and classism of social media users — the fact that he is, after all, an uneducated, simple tea-seller doing his job?
Wasn’t it the disbelief that even poor men could look handsome that gave a majority of people the kick to share his photo, reducing an individual to his profession, referring to him as a "chaiwala"? Wasn’t it an astonishment that stemmed from this disbelief that made Arshad so attractive?
It was.
What proves this is the way people reacted when the photographer Jiah Ali posted Arshad's photo, probably clicked with a mobile phone camera, unedited, when she went back to inform him that he has become an online sensation. People who found the blue-eyed young Pashtun man hot suddenly realised how a professional photographer’s timing, talent, instrument and editing can transform a commoner into a demigod.
Perhaps, they quickly remembered that he is a poor, hapless chaiwala who cannot afford to even dream of being famous some day. I saw many tweets which said that Arshad is not attractive anymore because he is uneducated, he can't even answer questions fired at him by (over-enthusiastic) TV reporters, that he is so shy, and so on.
A photo posted by Jiah Ali (@jiah_ali) on
Hello? Wake up!
Did Arshad come to each one us with a placard saying "I am hot"? No.
The photographer who posted Arshad Khan’s photo on her Instagram profile with a caption that read "hot-tea" perhaps did not realise she was objectifying a human being, a man.
Hundreds of thousands of women, who shared his photo saying they’d attain "nirvana" if the 18-year-old boy fed them a cup of hot chai, should have realised it. They didn’t either.
A leading online publication that introduced Arshad to Indians titled their article "Guys, there is a really HOT chaiwala in Pakistan" and other publications followed suit.
When people, including me, said, "The Pakistani chaiwala should be in movies", we were all subconsciously giving ourselves an ego massage and telling ourselves that "sometimes, only sometimes, even poor people could be handsome".
Yes he smiles ???? #sorryladies #jiahsphotography #islamabad #pakistan #chaiwala
A photo posted by Jiah Ali (@jiah_ali) on
We told ourselves and others that he is hot. We told the world that he is hot. We told him that he is hot. It also shows how we humans, across borders, strongly associate hotness to physical appearance alone.
Tinder age, this truly is.
Gender bias and inherent hypocrisy
The whole episode also tells us how hypocritical we are and how gender discrimination and gender bias is so deeply rooted in our minds.
Arshad, a tea vendor, was possibly clicked without his permission (maybe Jiah showed him the photos after clicking it), and his photos were possibly posted online without his consent. What happened here is, in the most subtle words, violation of someone's privacy and mere objectification of a man.
It doesn't strike us at first because everything is so "positive here". Here is a good-looking man — a man in the first place — whose good looks managed to get so much attention and appreciation from around the world, tensions between two neighbouring countries eased a bit (maybe not) and the poor fellow also landed a modelling contract.
But...
What if a male photographer had captured the photo of a woman, say a fish vendor, without her consent (or even with her consent), and what if he had posted her photo online saying she is stunningly hot?
Would he not have been slammed by people across the globe for objectifying a woman? For clicking a photo and posting it online of a person who'd possibly never come to know that he is doing it. For trying to sell his "art" by making a human being, a woman, a mere object of attraction?
Why is there a sharp contrast when the basic issue — of objectification of a human being — remains the same but the gender is different?
There’s no doubt that Arshad Khan is indeed a handsome man, but let us accept that he was objectified, and that many online publications capitalised on our classist, elitist, hypocritical thought process.