Dawn Images

Criticising someone for being happy is about as low as a person can get and this low was reached recently when a number of Pakistani internet users slammed Bushra Ansari for attending and dancing at a wedding.

Yes, you read that right. Ansari, the veteran actor, recently attended the mehndi of Shahmeer Shunaid, the grandson of Sultana Siddiqui, the head of the Hum Network. She was among a number of celebrities who attended the festivities and celebrated with the family. However, people seem to have an issue with her celebration.

A video of Ansari dancing with Azaan Sami Khan, the son of Zeba Bakhtiar and Adnan Sami Khan, was the subject of people's criticism. Apparently they believe that when you cross a certain age, your body should shut down and not allow you to have fun anymore. To sum up their criticism, they believed she shouldn't be dancing "at her age" and that since she once schooled Jannat Mirza on religion, she shouldn't be doing "un-Islamic thing".

Ansari responded to the hate in an Instagram post on Monday.

She began by talking about her grief at losing her sister Sumbul Shahid and said her loved ones insisted she attend the dholki as a way to get away from the stress and sadness.

"I just tried to be part of [Sultana Siddiqui's] "khushi" and got up for two minutes with my son Azaan to show my participation in their happiness," she said. Why we are asking a 65-year-old woman (or anyone for that matter) to justify her actions is beyond us.

"But sad to see people's reaction. They just want to see us unhappy because we are famous and specially when somebody is over a certain age. How pathetic," she wrote and we agree. It is pathetic to be so hateful that seeing someone else's joy makes you upset.

"I am telling you this is the best age to enjoy life when you are done with all your duties and Alhamdullillah I've achieved so much in this age, I don't have any regrets if I am over 60. So this is a cheap weapon of telling elders that you are old and you have no right to be happy. Why not?" Ansari asked.

"I don't understand why young kids feel insecure of older people. If this is the only flow being old, please change your thinking or treat your parents the same way and my comment about Islam was just about respect for other religions. God forbid if some body wears any symbol of our religion, how would we feel?

"Our kids shud know what does "cross" means," she said, referring to the Jannat Mirza incident. Mirza, a TikTok star, posted a video wearing a cross — a Christian religious symbol — around her waist as a belt. In response, Ansari said, "Aik dur fitteh mun to banta hai, in jaahil stars par afsos. Na Islam ka pata na kisi aur religion ka [curses are in order for these disappointing, ignorant stars. They don't know Islam nor any other religion.]"

"I'm not answerable to any faceless troller because they never leave any one even after wearing hijab. So stop hurting people it's also not allowed in Islam," Ansari wrote in her recent post.

Posting mean things on the internet is easy when you're hiding behind a nameless account or avatar. The people who post these comments seem to have little understanding — or don't care at all — that they're talking about real people. When you say something cruel about someone on the internet, it isn't lost in a vacuum — it may reach your victim. It's easy to be bullies sitting behind keyboards with little accountability and even less shame but people who post these mean things should remember that what goes around comes around.

Young trolls, you are going to grow old one day too and we hope your successors won't be as vicious as you, though we doubt they'll spare you either.

The only thing Bushra Ansari did wrong here was post this response — she is not answerable to anyone, least of all random internet trolls, and she didn't have to justify herself at all. She doesn't owe anyone an explanation for dancing at a wedding or anything else.