Photos: Internet
As we celebrate International Mother Language day, we also take time to ponder on the startling growth of communication. It is shaping our world and communities with fresh ideas as well as controversial ones, like never before.
In today’s social media savvy world where everything is digitised, everyone feels empowered to express their views. Be it an anonymous blog or comments on Twitter or status updates on Facebook, people across the world are texting, typing or sharing images of what they had for dinner and adding the latest emoji’s to spice up their content. Undoubtedly our power to communicate has reached a wider audience than ever before. In this new world writing is no longer for the educated crème de la crème, it’s for the masses. However, the fine boundaries of what is acceptable, what is mainstream, what is marginalised, what is provocative or what is hate speech, seems to be blurry in this overall concept of freedom of expression. The racist and Islamophobic comments by the US Republican Party presidential candidate Donald Trump or the ‘Draw Muhammad art Contest’ in Texas organised by Pamela Geller are clear examples of indignation, for instance. Also, these aren’t isolated incidents of ‘hate speech,’ since it’s happening across the world against many ethnic and religious minorities.
Consequently, after a year, French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo was back in the news again and this time for a cartoon that according to critics, pushes its provocative brand of humour too far. The publication sparked outrage as the cartoon depicts the three year old Syrian toddler Aylan Kurdi, whose death last year triggered a global wave of sympathy for migrants, growing up to become a molester; the kind blamed for the recent wave of mob sexual assaults in Cologne, Germany. The cartoon was immediately condemned on social media, with many labelling it as both offensive and racist.
Many questioned whether people, around the world who tweeted #JeSuisCharlie in solidarity after the January 2015 attacks, would feel the same way in light of the recent cartoon.
The best response came from Queen Rania of Jordan, who not only publicly criticised the satirical magazine but mirrored the premise of the Charlie Hebdo cartoon in a more positive manner. Teaming up with Jordanian cartoonist Osama Hajjaj another cartoon was made depicting Alan as a doctor and a successful member of the society. Rania and Osama’s work were later produced in English, French and Arabic. It read, “What would little Aylan have grown up to be?” “Aylan could’ve been a doctor, a teacher, a loving parent.”
While there is no question that certain images, articles, blogs and speech is aimed towards ridiculing a particular religion, race or ethnicity, however offensive they may be to the masses, many would stand firm by it as it qualifies under the banner ‘freedom of expression.’ This is a vital component in a thriving democracy, which strongly advocates the concept of not regulating ideas but promotes a ‘free market’ of thoughts. ‘Citizens are sellers and buyers’ and better ideas will eventually win out over the bad. This highlights the difficulty in balancing an individual’s right to voicing their own opinion while protecting community interests and deterring hate crimes, at the same time.
The balancing act between freedom of expression and hate speech tends to differ across countries and cultures. Questioning a set of beliefs, customs and rituals does not amount to hate speech. In retrospect, inciting violence or acts of discrimination based on ones race, religion or ethnicity constitutes as hate speech. In India, our neighbouring country, the constitution protects communities against hate speech based on religion, race, place of birth, caste and so forth. The law permits victims to seek legal action against the perpetrators. However, this should not be so, as communities have greater access to finding ways to understand and respect differences, which ultimately is a vital component towards being progressive and culturally confident.
Freedom of speech, three words that get thrown around and written about so often that what the expression means is more about misinformation than truth. Yet the best way to combat hate speech is to use the very tools to combat these ideas as seen in Queen Rania’s take on Charlie Hebdo. With every right comes responsibility and therein lies the keys to articulate a more equittable platform.