Is it justified to form a derogatory opinion about a place based on what you find on internet?
Northeast India has often been a victim of racist slurs and misconceptions, especially concerning the food habits of the region. Some half-baked content on internet add ‘authenticity’ to these myths.
Here are a few misconception busters straight from Northeast India.
People of Northeast India eat EVERYTHING :
A recent post by a person residing in Dubai on Facebook, comparing the markets of Northeast India to the Chinese ones created an outrage on social media.
The person’s comparison of the food markets of Northeast India to those of China shows how misconceptions about the food culture of Northeast India have travelled across borders. This is definitely not the first time when people who have never visited this beautiful region put their biased thoughts online.
Firstly let us understand what “wet markets” actually mean . Wikipedia defines them as a marketplace selling fresh meat, fish, produce, and other perishable goods. Meaning any place where fresh food is available on the demand of the customer is a wet market. And this form of markets include farmer’s markets and fish and poultry markets as well. So is it just Northeast India which has fish markets or is it the whole world have markets like China.
The main difference which the writer failed to understand was the products that were being sold. While the lot of Chinese markets often deal with endangered species, the ones in Northeast deal in legal ones. Illegal ones definitely pop up once a while, only to be taken down by local authorities.
Other Misconceptions :
Another mistake which some random content writer from some website wrote was “Asam Laksa” is a popular streetfood of Assam. We really dont understand how you can confuse between a popular streetfood of Malaisya with a state in Northeast just because the name sounds similar. And few other websites copied the same content without verification.
These articles are published on some of the widely read sites. Hence, the content shared by these sites reach to a lot of people. The content writers of these sites should verify information before making it available to public.
While people in Northeast are being accused of eating ‘everything’, people are less aware of the fact that Northeast India as well as the rest of the country, has adopted many necessary measures to stop poaching of wild animals.
According to a report over 9,000 people have been arrested for wildlife poaching across the India during 2012-2018.
Also, amid lockdown four people in Nagaland were booked after a video surfaced which depicted ruthless killing of wild animals including a barking deer.
Showing a biased picture of the region not only defames it but also overshadows the cultural richness that it posseses. The Northeastern region is a treasure trove of culture, diversity, natural beauty and amazine cuisine waiting to be explored and understood.
