Sreejita De: Social media has made everyone the nosy neighbour you hate

Actor Sreejita De finds it funny when people speculate about her personal life, assuming she is quitting the entertainment industry for a life in Germany with her fiancé Michael Blohm-Pape. And she blames social media for adding to the noise.

“As an actor, I put my life out there, because it is easier than refuting speculations but having said that I’m not answerable to any of them. When I made my relationship official, I read comments like I’m quitting acting and moving to Germany,” De says, adding, “How does one guess, one assume rather? In this bargain, people are talking about things I’m not doing instead of the work I’ve done or could do”.

The actor, who officially got engaged on December 21 last year, picks the buzz around Alia Bhatt and Ranbir Kapoor’s relationship as an example, lauding her for taking a stand when she called out the “archaic way of thinking” after a report claimed that Kapoor will go to London to pick her up.

“Alia taking a stand for herself was so empowering. Even in the past, only a few actors have called out wrong reporting. I feel the culprit here is social media. With its many pros, one being making the actors easily accessible to their fans, it somehow creates a sense of entitlement that audiences feel they have now & can use their freedom of speech rather too freely. The media tends to feed on this & which is why you see pregnancy news become of national interest,” says De, who was proposed by Blohm-Pape in front of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France.

Slamming social media for blurring the boundaries, De asserts, “Everyone’s interested in other people’s business, especially for actors”.

“It is worrisome when teenagers, young adults spend ridiculous amounts of time trolling, passing judgements, and putting ideas in the mind of the media instead of focussing on their career… What do you want to know more about? ,” she wonders while concluding.