One of the underrated aspects of the DRS is its effect on idea the of dissent. I have written about this previously and found reason to defend (with caveats) an unlikely candidate - Ricky Ponting. Umpire Daryl Harper of Australia, who was removed from the ICC's Elite Panel of Umpires in May 2011 along with Umpire Asoka de Silva, has withdrawn from the 3rd and Final Test of India's tour of the West Indies. He cited "unfair criticism" as the reason for his undoing.
DRS has pitted Umpires against the technology by way of the player review. Previously, a captain criticizing an umpire would be rare and frowned upon. Now that the Player Review has turned every Umpiring decision into a basis for negotiation, the idea of dissent itself has to be seen anew in this post-DRS world. A player now has a right to ask questions and be wrong twice in a Test Match innings and once in a limited overs innings. It is fantastical to believe that this changed relationship between player and umpire on the field will have no effect on this relationship off the field. Thanks to the ICC's acceptance of ball-tracking as evidence, players are now armed with this against Umpires. There is now another set of eyes which has been considered equivalent or superior to the Umpire, which can be set against the Umpire's judgment.
Even situations where DRS is not at work are affected by this. Every party in the Sabina Park Test has had a taste of DRS. Daryl Harper was shown up as being error prone under the glare of ball-tracking and hotspot, and under Dhoni, India have had a tenuous relationship with the player review and ball-tracking, most recently with the 2.5 metre rule during the ICC Cricket World Cup 2011.
In a sense, Darryl Harper is right, Dhoni's criticism was unfair in its content. It was also graceless and cavalier in its style, with more than just a slight trace of contempt. But DRS has legitimized the content of Dhoni's criticism, if not the style. In the post-DRS world, Umpires are no longer figures of authority - the last word on the cricket field. They are largely relics, waiting to be corrected in a heavy handed way by players who find their decisions merely inconvenient. That was what Sachin Tendulkar did to Ian Gould in the World Cup Semi Final. That is what Graeme Swann talks of when he talks of getting many more LBWs thanks to DRS.
The ICC currently has a system with too many moving, unreliable parts, and hence too many points at which it can be criticized - points at which a defense is at best weak, but usually non-existent.
Darryl Harper is just the latest victim.