Freedom_of_Speech

Freedom of speech is the political right to communicate one's opinions and ideas. The term freedom of expression is sometimes used synonymously, but includes any act of seeking, receiving and imparting information or ideas, regardless of the medium used. Now, since we know the exact definition of Freedom of Speech, which I copied from Wikipedia, let us proceed towards a detailed perusal of the very concept. Let us not discuss Freedom of Speech and how it is prominent in India, but let us instead discuss just freedom of speech, this vast sea that hydrates every being it reaches, enables them to furnish their throat disabled and bruised by forced silence and gives them, what can be put here better than the word itself, freedom. And how non-existent it really is, in its definition in our country precisely, also how this sea is drying up slowly because of the apathy that is young India. The Constitution of India provides the right to freedom, given in articles 19, 20, 21 and 22, with the view of guaranteeing individual rights that were considered vital by the framers of the constitution. The right to freedom in Article 19 guarantees the Freedom of speech and expression. This too, has been copied from Wikipedia. Anyway, let me bring into notice that yes, I am very aware of the freedom of speech being one of the six vital freedoms we have, or we claim to. It all exists in papers, in the book. But where is it, really' I am not talking about Indians being silenced by the Britons before the independence, neither am I talking about the Norway case where Indian parents are not getting a say in the custody of their child. I am talking about Indians, living in India, not being able to express their views, Indian in origin, to their fellow Indians. Is it because we are orthodox' Or is it because we are too dim to build opinions' Definitely not the latter, Sir Salman Rushdie is of Indian Origin, was Indian, almost all of his work tying its cords with veins of India and Indian Culture; Maqbool Fida Husain, needs no explanation at all, legend in himself, also Indian, was Indian, again. These cultural icons have not been exiled, but much worse than that, they are and were (in respective cases, may peace be upon Mr.Husain) living in self-exile. Is my rage sentimentalizing' Probably, I mean Sir Rushdie himself is very fond of our nation. And I do not imply by any means that India has become devoid of intellectual liberals, we still have Suhel Seth and Jug Suraiya, thank God. Freedom, such a beautiful word, isn’t it' And to be able to speak, having this freedom guaranteeing and protecting your words, is like multiple cherries on top. A free society is one in which a thousand flowers bloom, in which a thousand and one voices speak. And what a simple and grand idea that seems. It is as if we are the world, we are the children, and that is the song written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie. This is what we call the exercise of freedom of speech. It feels pretty good. At the time of the European Enlightenment in the 18th century, the great writers and intellectuals of that movement, Rousseau, Voltaire, Montesquieu, Diderot, knew that their real enemy was not the state but the Church. Earlier, when the mighty Rabelais was under fire from the Church, it was the King of France who defended him on the grounds of his genius. What an age that must have been, in which a writer could be defended because of his talent! But this is India, not Europe you may say, making your grandparents feel extremely proud of you for you hold the similar mentality. "That's a Western idea. That's not how we think over here.” there is a tendency to say that, one which lies among parents and school teachers specifically. But the Indian tradition also includes from its very earliest times, very powerful defences of free expression. In the Natya Shastra we see the Gods being a little bit bored in heaven and deciding they wanted entertainment. And so a play was made, about the war between Indra and the Asuras, telling how Indra used his mighty weapons to defeat the demons. When the play was performed for the Gods, the demons were offended by their portrayal. The demons felt that the work insulted them as demons. That demonic nature was improperly criticized. And they attacked the actors; whereupon Indra and Brahma came to the actors' defence. Gods were positioned at all four corners of the stage, and Indra declared that the stage would be a space where everything could be said and nothing could be prohibited. So in one of the most ancient of Indian texts we find as explicit and extreme a defence of freedom of expression as you can find anywhere in the world. This is not alien to India. This is our culture, our history and our tradition which we are in danger of forgetting and we would do well to remember it, our orthodoxy and our young public apathy contributing most to it. Yes, old times were really a lot harder than today but there was one thing - telling jokes, satirising and poking fun at and debunk certain aspects of religion and malicious political parties was common there was no sense that something shocking or wrong was being done. And ironically, in our generation of flying colors, we are congested in a society where criticizing an event pertaining to a popular person, within the bounds of IT freedom, may send you to jail, illegally sure, but hey “You shouldn’t do like that. This is India, not your spoiled Ellowen-Deeowen.” A culture of "offendedness" is growing up, not just in this country, elsewhere too, but substantially in this country, a culture in which your "offendedness" defines you. Who are you if nothing offends you' You're probably a ‘liberal' -- and who would want to be that' (Dripping with sarcasm) The fact is that in any open society people constantly say things that other people don't like. It's completely normal that that should happen and in any confident free society you just shrug it off and you proceed. That is normal. I, myself, am not very fond of Chetan Bhagat or Stephanie Meyer, but well take me for an example of being classy (and cocky). There is no way of creating a free society where nobody says things that other people don't like. If you are limiting yourself to the point where the only areas of practicing your freedom of speech are within the bounds of offence, there is basically nothing that can be said at all. In the words of Sir Rushdie himself, “What is freedom of expression' Without freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.” So do we have to be frightened of speaking about something controversial' Sadly, yes. Along with the idea of “offendedness”, there is the idea of respect, both ecstatically jumping far out of their defined context. When you respect somebody, the idea is that you listen, you take them seriously. The idea nowhere projects that you should agree. But now that term ‘respect’ is being used a way of demanding assent. "If you disagree with me, you are disrespecting me. And I will get very angry and may even pick up a weapon; because that's my way when I am disrespected." The reason for why we feel scared, somehow naturally nowadays, to express our views is because behind these ideas of "offendedness" and "respect", there is always the threat of violence. Always, the threat is that if you do that which that disrespects or offends me, I will be violent towards you. Recently in India, there have been religious attacks aimed at many of the arts. We know some of the big headline cases. We know about the Hindu mobs who destroyed the set of Deepa Mehta's film Water, the production of which was delayed for many years and eventually took place in Sri Lanka. We know about the shameful treatment of Husain Sahab, an artist who should have been revered by this country, who was instead driven out of it. We know about the harsh treatment of Sir Salam Rushdie and his book ‘The Satanic Verses’ because it was supposedly very offensive to Muslims, it is offensive but not the extent that it may result in sending death threats to Sir Rushdie (Besides, I would like to point out that India was the first country to ban the book when it came out. A few people had read it, Muslims even, and stated that it is a very important book for Muslims, blasphemous sure but Rushdie is an atheist, there can exist no blasphemy if there is no belief. The finance minister of India banned the book, a year prior to the infamous Fatwa issued by Ayatollah Khomeini giving the right to Muslims to murder Rushdie, because of which this epitome of an author had to live in disguise and in hiding for 9 years. And so we know that the Indian public never got a chance to express their views on the book. Possession of the book is still illegal in India, so is trading it. But in the times of technology, banning a book is simply absurd). We know the craven behaviour of Bombay University when some Sena apparatchik attacked Rohinton Mistry's novel, and the book was immediately removed from syllabus. We know the dreadful behaviour of Delhi University which withdrew the classic essay of A.K. Ramanujan, 300 Ramayans, because a few Hindus decided that it was anti-Ram. The Babri Masjid case, a controversy it is, but the demolition of it being unethical of various sorts. We see these things happening almost every day. We see a gay artist being attacked in a gallery by thugs. We know very well the cases of Aseem Trivedi and of Shaheen and Renu. Voices are being silenced. Publishers are more frightened to publish. Galleries are more afraid to display certain kind of art; certain kind of films would not be made that might have been made 15 -20 years ago. The chilling effect of violence is very real and it is growing in this country. Yes there is freedom to protest against what you feel is wrong, surely, but resorting to anti-social, illegal and violent activities, attacking the author’s or artist’s personal integrity, burning of books is not protest, it is hooliganism. And the other part of this story involves all of you. There is a public apathy towards these attacks. We approve of the great technological and industrial and economic growth of our country but we don't seem to value our cultural artifacts in the same way, even though, the greatest thing about Indian history is the incredible richness of the Indian artistic and cultural tradition. The contemporary manifestations of that seem to be neglected; and these ideas, the ideas that you should not upset people, you should not upset religious interest groups, these have broad acceptance in the public mind. “Who gives you the right to upset people'” I would say who gives people who claim to be upset, the right to come and attack the marvelous jewels of India' The subject is violence, and the threat of it, which prevents dissenting voices from speaking. Violence is not the answer to offensive literature or art, what is answering as well as respectable is more literature and art with a view that presents the other side of the picture, the right for the wrong and the true to the false, or the opposite for that matter, it is completely plausible. I have been watching debates on Headlines Today as well as on youtube, as much as I weep over the fact that it is almost 2013 and Women’s rights are still nominally being discussed in India, that slut shaming and rape culture and a homophobic as well as a very kitschy society is being developed in our country much to my dismay, I have also found some extremely inspiring role models. Sir Salman Rushdie being the most prominent one, I have always been a very huge fan of his writing, but his liberal views have also inspired me to qualify myself as a person who is capable of accepting change and building opinions as well as putting them on paper, always keeping politics a metre away from religion and stereotypical Indian society. His struggle for free speech is what inspired me to write this essay, and so I would like to conclude this piece of thoughts with a wonderful paragraph from his speech which I cannot modify by any means, let alone put into better words. “The people are more sensible than their leaders. India deserves to be led better than it's being led. It deserves leaders who can bring her back to the non-sectarian, non-communal land which the nation's founders envisaged. The idea of that India can be, not so much forged as renewed. Forged anew. And it can be done only if all of us have the ability to speak our minds. To speak freely without fears of religious or governmental reprisals. The human being, let's remember, is essentially a language animal. We are a creature which has always used language to express our most profound feelings and we are nothing without our language. The attempt to silence our tongue is not only censorship. It's also an existential crime about the kind of species that we are. We are a species which requires to speak, and we must not be silenced. Language itself is a liberty and please, do not let the battle for this liberty be lost.”