Abusers of press freedom deserve punishment
I must register my frustration with some recent editorial comments made in The Daily Star about freedom of speech and freedom of the press. In the April 5th editorial regarding jailed bloggers, it says that the constitutional right to free speech “does not give anyone free rein to hurt to religious sentiments of others”. In the April 13th editorial dealing with the seizure of Amar Desh and abuses of the freedom of the press, it reads “the answer cannot be to curtail it”. These seem to be contradictory sentiments where one right can be restricted for “abuses” and not the other.
While I am not encouraging people to insult the religious beliefs of others, I do believe that people should be free to discuss or debate religion or other issues, including opinions that may be unpopular to some people, without fear of criminal action. The limit of both freedoms should be at the point of inciting violence, which is an unacceptable use of either right.
Many of the people who were “offended” by blog postings or Facebook comments, did not even see the material in question, but were told of it by others and encouraged to join processions by people with their own motives. The crowd rounded up to protest the individual who is accused of nothing more than “liking” an allegedly questionable posting on Facebook seems particularly excessive. There is also the fact, detailed on a few occasions by The Daily Star, of just how easy it is to create false postings to incriminate others online.
The behaviour of Amar Desh on the other hand, summarized in the editorial, goes above and beyond the reasonable limits of the free press, including publishing false reports and photos for the deliberate purpose of promoting violence. Newspapers are held to a higher standard of integrity and responsibility by the public and in a country like Bangladesh reach far more people than any individual blogs or Facebook pages. There is no question these are the actions of the newspaper in question and they have been far more destructive than those of the bloggers. The bloggers should be freed and Amar Desh punished.
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