Of free speech and fair-play

By Maheen A. Rashdi

'A great many people think they are thinking, when they are merely rearranging their prejudices.' … William James
Does our bigoted world allow free speech to all? No. Some always pay a price.
Early in November, the University of King’s College in Halifax hosted a conference titled; ‘The media’s right to offend: exploring legal and ethnic limits on free speech.’ How far it went in outlining the boundaries for the media and the ethnic limits of free speech is a rather long discussion. For the main part, the conference aimed at attacking religious thought and whether religious sentiments should be a factor in restricting free speech.
The discussions included cases in point in which the main case of recent date and significant media interest was that of Mark Steyn who was put on trial by the Canadian Human Rights Commission for writing an article which could allegedly perpetrate hatred against Muslims.
The real story goes that Steyn, a neo-conservative celebrity writer from Canada, was indicted on the plea of a Muslim law student who took offense at an article written by Steyn on Muslims. Published in Canada’s Macleans magazine (its equivalent to Times and Newsweek), the piece was titled, ‘The future belongs to Islam’ and it went on to make an argument that chances of Muslim hegemony over the world are high since they reproduce at a faster level! The article contained many sweeping statements regarding Islam validated by references to a supposedly authoritative book on Islam – Tahrirolvasyleh – a book written by Ayatollah Khomeini on how to be a Muslim. While the book hardly classifies as a well-known testimonial (the few people I asked, hadn’t heard of it before now), it is probable that it was the most fanatic tool the author could find to lace his story with every kind of extremity that fundamentalists are attributing to the religion.
To cut a long story short, the right wing supporters of freedom of speech were offended when the callow Muslim youth’s opinion was taken seriously by the Canadian Human Rights Commission to put Mark Steyn on trial. The law student who had approached the Canadian Islamic Congress (CIC) for their support was derided as was the CIC.
A Ryerson University journalism professor who tried to intervene and support the premise of the Muslim student’s plea was accused of acting guilty for being a white man. The comments hurled at the professor at the media conference when he attempted to explain why the Muslim boy was in the right when objecting to the article in Macleans were brutal and nasty. “He is a guilty white liberal who is willing to sacrifice our ancient liberal values of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and the separation of mosque and state, in an act of journalistic affirmative action.” This was written by another extreme right winger – author, lawyer, conservative political activist – Ezra Levant (infamous for reprinting the blasephemous cartoons in his magazine Western Standard), who prides himself for his radical activism and may the world be damned.
Freedom of speech has become a strange mantra in this age of excessive legislations on human rights and the accusation of criminalizing indigenous rights. With the world’s virtual space saturated with blogs and interactive forums, speech is not just free but sometimes too cheap. But journalists in newsrooms are mostly careful of not over stretching their ‘right to abuse’. It is a thin balance, but many of us still know how to get a point across without insulting. But there will always be those like Steyn or Levant who like to start a fire just for the heck of it. And when a young hot blood reacts to that, it turns into a nasty brawl and the culprits stand by donning a virtuous expression.
So how much of neo-nonsense being churned out by neo-conservatives should be taken seriously and how much of it should be passed over as poisonous emissions which will dissipate on their own just like all other unpleasant and smelly gasses eventually do.
Sometimes though, I realize it’s not easy to ignore abuse if it really upsets you. You charge into the enemy head first and think of the consequences later – remember Zidane and the 100th minute red card at the 2006 FIFA final? Oh what a head butt that was. And reportedly it was a reaction to what Italy’s Materazzi said about his mother!
But if moral superiority is to be achieved, one should remember that discretion is the better part of valour and with the world’s fingers lifted towards Muslims with or without pretext, it would be better to perhaps bide one’s time and build a counter argument with a sophisticated roll out plan which involves ‘intelligent opinions’.
The freedom to speak freely without censorship or limitations has many ramifications. In truth, freedom to say whatever you want is not given in totality by any country, where subsequent laws governing hate speech, discriminations and prejudices at least attempt to curb outrageous behaviour.
But with social injustice a rampant crime, impartial share of benefits is never possible. The harassed human rights proponents do try their best to protect sentiments of every faction of society but theirs is not an envious job. Being mindful of everyone will end up annoying someone! And that is exactly what the likes of Mark Steyn and Ezra Levant feel. They want to abuse whomever they don’t find fitting in with their description of human codes (as they abuse others of doing) and cannot abide it when their opinion is resisted.
One thing is clear, though. There is neither free speech nor fair-play to be found. It is only the privilege of some to be totally free to maintain opinions and giving others no right to come forth with an objection. While one is called, ‘freedom of expression’ the other is, ‘an intolerant response’. In layman’s term – what’s good for the goose is not good for the gander. – maheenrashdi@yahoo.ca