It is common knowledge that social media today is fertile ground

“It is common knowledge that social media today is fertile ground for trampling all over the decency of language. This is done not just by members of your party and your supporters but also those from the opposition. And their numbers are increasing every day.” Thus spoke Ravish Kumar, the journalist-philosopher of our modern age — a man who stands like a sentinel at the gates of truth, defending the dignity of words in an era where language itself is wounded. His words are not a complaint, but a warning — a cry against the corrosion of civility, the slow decay of discourse, and the loss of the moral beauty once carried by speech.

For Kumar, language is not merely a tool of communication; it is the soul of a civilization. To corrupt it is to corrupt the spirit of the people. In his homeland and beyond, he has seen how social media, that vast and restless marketplace of words, has become both a blessing and a curse. It carries voices across the world in a breath, yet it also magnifies hatred, deceit, and cruelty. What once was a space for expression has turned into an arena of verbal warfare, where decency is mocked as weakness, and insult is mistaken for wit. His warning rings universal: when the decency of language is trampled, truth itself begins to die.

The ancients knew this power well. In the marketplaces of Athens, Socrates taught that careless speech corrupts the mind that utters it. “The beginning of wisdom,” he said, “is the definition of terms.” To name rightly was to think rightly; to lie or to degrade was to poison thought itself. Yet now, in our modern agora — the digital realm — words are flung like stones, without care for consequence. Anonymous voices strike with venom, forgetting that every cruel word leaves a wound not only on its target but also upon the heart of the one who speaks it. Social media, once conceived as a tool of connection, has too often become the mirror of our moral confusion.

Ravish Kumar’s words arise not from bitterness, but from sorrow — the sorrow of a teacher watching his students destroy the very language that could have enlightened them. He knows that this decay is not bound by party or creed; it spreads across all divisions, from supporter to opponent, from the common man to the powerful. The poison is shared, and its reach grows with every careless post, every thoughtless insult. What was once dialogue has become combat, and what was once persuasion has become humiliation. When speech loses respect, democracy itself begins to tremble, for public discourse is the breath of freedom — and when that breath turns foul, the body of society sickens.

Consider the lesson of history: when the language of decency is lost, tyranny soon follows. In the final years of the Roman Republic, leaders learned to inflame rather than to reason, to mock rather than to debate. The Senate became a theater of scorn; the people’s faith in discourse eroded; and soon, the Republic fell beneath the weight of its own cynicism. Words, once sacred instruments of persuasion, became weapons of destruction. Ravish Kumar sees the same danger in our time — a warning that the collapse of language precedes the collapse of truth itself.

Yet, there is hope. For just as language can be corrupted, it can also be redeemed. Every act of decency, every thoughtful word, every honest conversation is a seed planted in the soil of renewal. Kumar’s call is not to despair, but to responsibility — to restore the honor of speech. Each of us must become a guardian of language, resisting the urge to respond to cruelty with cruelty, or mockery with scorn. The true warrior of the mind fights not with weapons, but with clarity, restraint, and compassion.

Therefore, O listener, take this teaching as a torch in the storm: guard your words as you would guard your soul. Speak not to wound, but to awaken. Let your language be the measure of your wisdom, and let your wisdom be seen in your kindness. For if the multitudes on the vast plains of social media can once again learn to speak with decency, then from the ruins of insult and division, a new harmony may arise.

And so, remember the wisdom of Ravish Kumar: when words lose their decency, society loses its direction. But when speech becomes noble again — truthful, respectful, and free — then even in the digital age, humanity may yet rediscover its voice. Speak, therefore, as one who builds, not one who breaks. For in the end, the fate of civilization rests not in the power of armies, but in the integrity of its language.