“When my children’s friends call me aunty, it’s fine. But when someone 45-plus calls me that, it’s not fine. I’m NOT THEIR AUNTY,” says Shunali Shroff at the start of the ‘Too Woke To Be Funny’ panel discussion at The Hindu Lit Fest 2024. Shroff and Kiran Manral were in conversation with Rosella Stephen, editor of The Hindu Magazine and Literary Review, about their podcast Not Your Aunty. Its episodes cover a range of topics from social media influencer Orry and actor Zeenat Aman’s comeback, to body positivity debates. But no matter the topic, they take pride in not mincing their words.
For instance, Stephen asked the duo what “woke culture” means to them, Shroff stated that it is “political correctness on steroids”, something she thinks will lead us to become a society that stops having conversations. “We’ll stop talking about the important topics,” she says. “We’ll just talk about the weather, and even here, we’ll argue about what gender to ascribe it.” Manral pointed out how “hyper-woke culture” is also a bullying culture because “it comes with the threat that if you don’t subscribe to my views, I’ll cancel you”.
