In the recent two decades we have heard a lot about freedom of speech. It has been recognized as a basic right of every individual in the world. Freedom of speech include the freedom of expressing ones thoughts and ideas in any format such as through spoken words, text, arts or gestures.
Many activists and proponents of freedom of speech has come forward across the globe either claiming that their platforms provide the absolute freedom of speech or demanding the freedom that they haven't achieved yet because of any sort of suppression from the government.
Almost all of the democratic countries in the world claim that they provide the freedom of speech in their states. However, the reality turns to be different.
My country, Pakistan, recently faced the instances that proved that people respect the freedom of speech as long as it is concerned with their personal benefits. The political parties that were accusing that the government was trying to suppress by their voice turned quite furious against the media channels that displayed the wrong doings of the same political parties when they became the government.
Similarly, some years ago I read about a case of banning a movie in America owing to the reason it was covertly attacking the then prime minister, Donald Trump.
Social media are the bigger claimer of providing the freedom of speech. Nevertheless, we all know how twitter and Facebook have displayed their biasness against some content. That's the story of centralized social media, the time is revealing that the case of decentralized social media is not going to be very different. A couple of days ago, I read a post of @themarkymark in which he described how a user was threatened by the admins of Blurt for raising his voice against a self-voter. Do you know about Blurt? It is a platform that was created with a premise to counter the negative effects of downvotes on social media like Hive.
What I have observed so far is nothing like absolute freedom speech has ever existed, nor it can exist ever. The influential people have always the power to curb the very freedom which they advertise for themselves.
I haven't ever heard in main stream media anything about the negative effects of freedom of speech. It is always screaming about its benefit. Nevertheless, the reality is not that simple. Where freedom of speech is everyone's basic right, it needs to be within boundaries to ensure the integrity, dignity and prosperity of everyone. Freedom comes with responsibility. If it is not exercised within the healthy limits, it is massively destructive. No body has any right to be disrespectful to any one. The difference of opinion should be displayed gracefully. No body should be allowed to spread hatred by exercising the so called freedom of speech. Some people utilize the freedom of speech to do propaganda against their opponents by spreading lies. There are instances when the emotions of the whole communities are hurt in the name of freedom of speech.
Allow me to say that the freedom of speech, if exercised irresponsibly, has the power to put the whole world on fire. To counter the negative effects there is a need to have some regulations. However, there is a question I have no answer for…… Is it possible to make some universal rules about the boundaries of this freedom? Because everyone has different approach towards each action. Something seen as freedom of speech by one person can be a bully for the other, and when such cases arise the influential neutral parties come forward to support the narrative which is in their own interests.
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Everyone has its own way of thinking and has the specific view about the different matters of life, but in Pakistan mostly I see and face that we have no freedom of speech and the next person only listen our talk when it's the favour of him and his rules....the bitter reality of our lives and society 💔
Have you experienced life outside Pakistan???? Things might be more bitter at other places.
In Pakistan people have freedom to discus their political and personal view. Police don't intervene. The parties can spread their ideas independently. There are places where a single word against the government may take you to the jail. Countries like korea know nothing about the world outside. There net service provide them nothing about the world outside. In Arabian countries, the imaam of masjid can't give a speech of his choice but he has to read what is provided to them on a paper by the government every Friday. I don't think Pakistan is in that much restrictions. Yes, on individual level we need to be more tolerant
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Thanks for the update ☺
You're welcome @amberkashif, that's a pleasure! Have a nice day 😊👍