Posted:
People have probably had an overload of AIB discussion. I want to step away from the specific issue of that show to a more general discussion on freedom of speech, censorship and public sensibilities. For it is a much broader issue with varying perspectives. A few brief discussions on the 50 Shades of Grey release worldwide and the censorship issues with NH10 show that censorship is still relevant.
I'd like to begin with the release of 50 Shades of Grey. In Malaysia the film is being outright banned as po*nography. I presume many conservative Islamic nations will follow suit (or the producers didn't even bother trying). The film is stuck in censor board in India with cuts and release info uncertain. USA, Canada, UK, Australia the so called western nations will be releasing it as R rated. France on the other hand gives it a rating equivalent to PG-12. The French censor board thinks twelve year olds can see it and one censor board member went on to call it as "schmaltzy", a term usually associated with Disneyesque chick flicks rather than a risqu romance involving some pretty hardcore BDSM. Many Europeans are like that. They actually wonder why USA is so uptight about sex and censorship. European romances and dramas will often have pretty explicit sex scenes, something even American audiences will blush about. Nudity is not at all a big deal. You could come across a full frontal nudity in a G rated flick as long as it was casual, not sexual. The family friendly comedy about the fall of communism in Germany "Goodbye Lenin" has full frontal male nudity a short while into the film, something considered XXX in USA. The Swedish comedy "Together" has an extensive scene of a woman and her hairy apparatus walking around the kitchen. Even the supposedly Orthodox Jewish Israel didn't have a problem with full frontal female nudity in "Turn Left at the End of the World".
Personally, I have always found myself agreeing more with the European brand of unadulterated libertarianism in comparison to the tempered liberalism practiced in USA and UK. Countries like Denmark, Netherlands, France, Germany have always had more freedom of speech. They have an unfettered uninhibited freedom of speech where even political correctness or reverence doesn't matter. Charlie Hebdo or Jyllands Posten didnt just insult Islam. They unapologetically published content that was anti-Semitic and anti-church too. They skewered political leaders and figures across Europe in the most risqu and rudest way. And that is how Freedom of Speech should be. As Voltaire said "I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend your right to say it". The content maybe the most offensive racist crap and go against all my sensibilities, but if someone wants to say it, I defend their right to say it.
A long time back when the KKK were going to hold a rally in my town, some coworkers asked me what I thought of it. They were expecting me to be angry and outraged, but were pleasantly surprised by the fact that I agreed the KKK had the right to assemble peacefully and exercise their constitutional rights. Same for Westboro Baptist church and their "God Hates Fags" rallies. I hated the motherf**ker and hoped he died the most painful death, but he had the right to protest. For me the bark and the bite are two separate things. The bark may lead to the bite. But until and unless there is a bite, you cannot preemptively clampdown the bark.
Someone or the other will always be offended. Someone or the other will always not like what you say. Someone or the other will always complain. And a lot of time the backlash will be founded in good reason. That by no means should result in clamping of free speech. The problem is that suppression of free speech is a slippery slope. You give an inch and people take a yard. The Catholic church gets an appeasement then pretty much every group including the majority group is seeking appeasement. Pretty soon you cannot say anything at all because some group or the other will seek appeasement. More dangerous is the government. You let them exercise power to shut down one faction, before you know it you are under authoritarian leadership like North Korea, China or Islamic theocracies. You may be excited when the government extends its power to censor something that you don't like, but the day won't be far when it comes back and censors you because it doesn't like it.
The USA is by no means a beacon of free speech. We do have our own issues. I keep hoping that we shift more towards European libertarianism, but there are setbacks. And the setbacks actually come with our obsession with political correctness than otherwise. However, I do feel we are much more progressive than India. Our conservative groups are all bark, no bite. They are more fodder for late night show jokes rather than actually cause someone to delete their content, or publicly apologize. We actually can make movie criticizing and trashing Presidents in office without repercussions. We can actually speak ill of people in power on social media without pages being deleted or being arrested. We actually have a ratings system where instead of censoring at cutting films the motion picture board decides that people should decide for themselves. There are many civil liberties lacking in India. And to the contrary this is not to demean India, but said in the same spirit when I talk about the civil liberty issues we face in America.
Point - what are your views on censorship, what should be censored, why not, what is the line, how, why. Pretty much everything under the sun about the subject.
Geet - Hui Sabse Parayee
Advocate Anjali Awasthi
