The drastic changes in
the PEMRA Ordinance designed to muzzle the electronic media were decried and
banned TV channels aired their popular shows on the roadside in defiance of the
repressive measures of the regime. Intellectuals, lawyers, activists and
members of a so-called civil society vehemently supported the freedom of the
media, the right to information and the centrality of free speech for a
functioning democracy to take root. It goes to the credit of the vibrant print
and electronic media in Pakistan that it highlighted the lawyers’ movement
against dictatorship and incessantly underscored the importance of the rule of
law.
Despite these
developments, there is a need to interrogate the notions of “free speech” and
“independence of the media” which have been formulated in the context of
liberal democracy. Liberal democracies
support all kinds of individual freedoms, liberties and rights as these are the
basic ingredients of a healthy democracy. Paradoxically, there is a danger to
liberty and freedom itself when no limits or boundaries are placed upon
freedom. Unbridled freedom can easily turn into its opposite and function as a
brake on the freedom of others; hence the old maxim that “your freedom ends
where my nose begins”. The most obvious example of free speech denying the
rights of people is “hate speech” – whether by religious or secular
zealots-designed to incite violence against a particular religious, ethnic or
regional group.
As most often
proclaimed, the freedom of speech is the “freedom to speak freely without
censorship or limitation. The synonymous term freedom of expression is
sometimes used to denote not only freedom of verbal speech but any act of
seeking, receiving and imparting information or ideas, regardless of the medium
used. Freedom of speech and freedom of expression are closely related to, yet
distinct from, the concepts of freedom of conscience and freedom of thought.” Such freedoms are deemed necessary for the
promotion and protection of democracies since free press and media are
considered to be the watchdogs that keep governments in line. The right to
freedom of speech is recognized as a human right under Articles 19 of the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).
It is axiomatic to say
that the freedom of speech is not absolute. In fact no right or liberty can
ever be absolute for then it often tends to turn into its own negation.
Contradictions and conflicts within the liberty and rights discourse arise from
many sources. Societies and legal systems generally recognize the limits of
free speech, particularly when this freedom conflicts with competing values.
All rights, speech and expression being no exception-exist in a context of
competing values-and legal systems devise ways of balancing values and rights
against one another. It goes without saying that the rights and freedoms of
those who are powerful and dominant tend to prevail over the freedoms of those
with less power and resources.
Liberal philosopher
like John Stuart Mill ‘on Liberty’ enunciated ‘harm principle’ as one of the
limitations of free speech. Mill argued that “there ought to exist the fullest
liberty of professing and discussing, as a matter of ethical conviction, any
doctrine, however immoral it may be considered.” He explained that “the fullest
liberty of expression is required to push arguments to their logical limits,
rather than the limits of social embarrassment.’ Mill proposed the following
limitation of free expression:
“The only purpose for
which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized
community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.”
A second form of limitation
on free speech, the “offense principle” has been proposed by Joel Feinberg. Feinberg
asserts that Mill’s “harm principle” is insufficient in providing protection
against wrongful behavior as it sets the bar too high and fails to take into
account serious offense that does not amount to actual harm or injury. He
believes that some forms of expression can be legitimately prohibited by law as
they are too offensive to one or several groups in a society. However, as
offending someone is less serious than actual injury or harm, the penalties
should be lesser than those for causing harm.
Liberal democratic
philosophies have myriad approaches to the complex issue of the freedom of speech,
particularly in terms of balancing it with competing values. The burden of
demonstrating the necessity of limitation has been placed on the state as it is
recognized that restrictions should be the exception rather than the rule. The
debate between free speech versus hate speech has taken on critical dimensions
in the wake of the post-9/11 world enmeshed in the nightmarish “war on terror”
and epoch-making conflicts between nations, religions and civilizations.
According to Marc Perelman, the Bush administration is seeking to defend the
First Amendment and freedom of speech against apparent attempts by Muslims to
stifle this freedom through the UN. He writes:
“The Bush
administration, European governments and advocates of freedom of speech are
ramping up efforts to counter what they see as a campaign by Muslim countries
to suppress speech abut religion, especially Islam. There is mounting concern
in Western countries that Muslim regimes are using a series of high-profile
incidents, most notably the outrage provoked by the newspaper publication of
caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad (SAWW) in Denmark, to stifle free speech
and divert attention from their own repression of religious freedom at home.”
However, Muslims do not
seem to be the only ones opposed to offensive speech acts; there were mass
protests by orthodox Christians against the showing of The Last Temptation of Christ, a film by Martin Scorcese that
poignantly depicted the conflict between the humanity and divinity of Jesus
Christ. Similarly, in India there were protests when and Indian actress
appeared nude in the film Siddhartha as it was perceived as being alien to
Hindu values. There have also been protests in India against films like Water which depicted the suffering of
windows in India. The balance between religious sensibilities and the right to
free speech is not an easy one to maintain because the issue gets tied up with
questions of power and inequality. Ayesha Khan attempts to highlight the
interface between religious prejudice, power and inequality the explosive
context of current geo-politics:
“Why must the Western
world make cartoons of our Prophet? Why must Britain knight Salman Rushdie, when
he has brazenly offended the sentiments of so many Muslims? Why must Sherry
Jones write a derogatory novel about the Prophet’s wife? This is not about free
speech, but about hate speech. A large part of the eastern world, including
countries like Pakistan, India and Thailand, takes religion very seriously. Yet
only Islam is singled out for jest. Not Hinduism; not Buddhism; no other
religion. Why? Is it because the West likes to see the reaction and then mock
it? Or is it because the reaction helps it form the type of image of Islam it
needs to justify its own gruesome actions against this hatred and lunacy? After
all, what better way to deal with such hate-mongers than to eradicate them altogether
and invade their countries one after the other?”
Apart from the Bush administration’s
efforts, a new”coalition to defend free speech” was launched on 2 October 2008
in Washington. Major free speech advocacy groups and leading human rights
groups inclined towards a liberal philosophy, such as the American Civil
Liberties Union and Human Rights Watch, have declined to join the coalition.
While a serious and intellectual
critique of any religion is an academic exercise of great value, for it allows
the religion to grow and develop through debate and even discard some of its unacceptable
practices or beliefs, it is hardly justifiable to ridicule and make fun of a
minority religion by a powerful majority. It seems that when the sentiments of
be defended at all costs. Nonetheless, in the case of the sentiments of another
community, the freedom of religion and respecting minority sentiments becomes the
paramount concern. When the two rights, freedom of speech and freedom of
religion/minority rights, come into a conflict, the resolution is almost always
in favor of those who are powerful. Double standards, arising from an
inconsistent application of norms and values, lead to the legitimized scapegoating
of the followers of a particular religion or ideology.
The current discourse on the
independence of the media in Pakistan appears to have been mainly drawn from
liberal philosophy. It decries any shackles on the media placed by the state
and upholds the freedom to conduct criticism of the policies and actions of the
government, leaders and their actors. This discourse is based on the notion
that freedom consists in the absence of restrictions from external sources- the
state, society, powerful groups or individuals. In this sense it seems to be a
fairly limited notion that freedom since it refers only to limits placed by
outside power in some punitive form.
Freedom from government restrictions or
draconian press laws does not guarantee freedom form religious prejudice,
patriarchal bias or ethnic narrow-mindedness. The dominant discourse on media freedom
seems to imply that the media, be they print or electronic, operate in a
socio-historical vacuum. This misperception creates the impression that some
kind of absolute freedom can be attained by media persons as though they have a
neutral and impartial space from where they can view everything in a detached
way. It is a self-evident fact that no person is located in neutral space-we
all live in structured societies divided along the many horizontal and vertical
axes of class, caste, gender, patriarchy, ethnicity, religion or sect. being
differentially positioned in relation to the State and centers of power, some
people have access to more resources, power and influence than others. The
structures of patriarchy, feudalism, tribalism and capitalism, in their
specific cultural and other forms, surround our daily existence and no person
is immune to their influences seductions or repulsions.
We are enslaved by our own version of
the world we live in and our actions are determined by how we perceive this universe.
There can, therefore, be no such thin as a totally “free” or “impartial” media
the best that one can hope for is a media aspiring to the best standards and rigors
of journalism that are possible in the face of human limitations.
Corporate media the world over are
extremely powerful in coining /fabricating and propagating “the truth”.
Choosing to depict one thing at the stake of concealing another, framing out
one fact to highlighting another, the electronic media in particular construct
the world in which people live. What is left unsaid and unspoken is as much a
part of the “truth” that the media create as what is shown and spoken.
Silencing some aspects of reality, over-emphasizing others, the media frame
reality for us and make us see what they what us to see and hear what they want
us to hear; they deafen us against what we are not allowed to hear and saturate
our world with what they aim to stress.
Relating Iraq war as well as the
so-called “war on terror”. If one only watched Fox news, CNN and other US
channels one would easily reach the following conclusions: the US is a great
and moral empire; Muslims and some others are a major evil out there; these
evil people are seeking to destroy the good guys; Iraq has weapons of mass
destruction and deep links with Al Qaeda and was involved in the 9/11 attacks;
however, the great and brave US soldiers will defend and protect the country
that is spreading democracy and freedom in the (un)free and shackled world.
Obviously, those who watched other channels, such as Al-Jazeera, may have
developed a different view of the world. However, the power of the media in
creating and disseminating specific ideologies is immense in this age of
Satellite TV, Internet, cell phones, SMS, digital cameras, cinema and advanced
print technology. The Indian and global media ran a marathon of 72 hours on the
Mumbai terror attacks in November 2008. For a while there was no other reality.
Without any confirmed information about who was behind the attacks, media anchors
were calling for blood and for parts of Pakistan to be carpet-bombed.
One of the biggest myths of the modern
times is that corporate global media are independent. Located in the hear o
capitalism and military might, the giants of international media appear to be
handmaidens of the global corporate war machine and terror. The US reporting of
the recent strikes by US drones and soldiers on Pakistan territory, as analyzed
by Anthony DiMaggio:
“American media coverage, conversely, is
driven by a warmongering that’s remarkable indifferent to the dangers involved
in escalating the conflict. US attacks on Pakistan inevitable carry the risk of
further inciting Pakistani anger against the US. Such anger takes on a renewed
urgency in light of widespread political and military instability, and the
recent emboldening of anti-governmental Islamic forces.”
It may not be a correct assumption that
the powerful players in global media are unaware of the devastating
consequences of their actions or of the human rights implications of such
war-mongering. It may be closer to the truth to think that there is an almost
deliberate attempt to demonize the “other: with the objective of strengthening
the American war machine which is deeply liked with the global corporate world
in a relationship of mutual benefit. The examples of speech and silence,
omission and commission by leading US newspapers underscore the importance of
limits on “free” speech. There seems to be a thin line that divides ”free’
speech from “hate” speech in a global context.
Concerns about unethical practices that
threaten journalism have been raised by Jose Torres in thoughtful report on the
media as: “Amid developments like – racial, religious, cultural and political
conflicts that most of the time lead to shooting wars – are the media, which
most of the time are used by partisan interest to deceive, sow falsehood and
speculation, and provoke misunderstanding, hatred and violence. It should not
be the norm for journalism and the media whose basic tenets are accuracy and
fairness, to aid the spread of lies and deception. Unfortunately, technological
advances in the delivery of news, the growing commercial interests of media organizations
and the drive tor dominate by institutions and states; have contributed to the
erosion of the tradition of truth-telling in the media.
“[The media is] the handmaiden of power,
without which it is inconceivable. It is an instrument to assist in the
attainment, preservation or continuance of somebody’s power, whether exercised
by an individual, an institution or a state. It is the extension of physical
power into the realm of the id and the spirit.”
The advertising industry has long been
known to use women’s bodies as commodities to sell anything form soap to
motorbikes, from cigarettes to tractors. The psychological assumption that goes
with this commodification is that the affect and passion felt naturally for a
female body would automatically transfer to the commodity to be sold thus
making it more attractive for men to buy. Money, commerce and the
commodification of all social relations have led to women being deployed as
weapons in the war for markets.
Does the independence of the media mean
that hate speech leading to murder should be allowed? Does the freedom of
speech override the right to life? Which right or freedom has greater value:
life or speech? The media have screamed hoarse about their right to freedom and
has receive the support of lawyers and civil society in their quest. However,
the responsibility that comes with any version of “freedom” is not evident.
Freedom cannot mean the right to do anything irrespective of consequences. This
brings us back to the issue of the ethics of journalism and the norms of
justice and morality that must underpin any form of freedom. Aiden White, the
IFJ’s secretary general says: “The
manipulation of public opinion by media-savvy extremists and the poisoning of
pubic discourse happen because individuals and groups that express themselves
freely do not aim at truth. When journalism is inaccurate, when it marginalizes
important issues or denies access to different voice and when it is manipulated
to serve narrow interest, it damages democracy. It cannot be right that with
the supposed expansion of free expression, the quality of information delivered
by the media should be declining. Journalists must start standing up for
principles to circulate the worries, fears and inquires of people who have no
institutional voice.” White urges journalists to “ennoble their audiences”
using the media’s power “to educate, enlighten and to unite perceptions in
order to satiate noble causes.
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