What Price Freedom?

WE hail it among the loftiest of human ideals. So much so that it was cast in stone as Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948.

That we can speak freely without fear of repercussion is as sacred as life itself. Its sacrosanct virtue is perhaps best captured in the adage credited to Voltaire’s biographer Evelyn Beatrice Hall: “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it”.

But how far would a society truly tolerate views that its members hold as abhorrent? A string of recent controversies in the United Kingdom suggest that the likes of Hall may be peddling a utopian vision.

Take for instance the recent public reaction following British bishop Richard Williamson’s Holocaust doubting assertion. In a January television interview, Williamson questioned whether gas chambers really existed in Nazi concentration camps, lowering the death toll of Jews killed during the reign of the Third Reich from six million to some 300,000 casualties. Aired shortly after the ultra-conservative priest was readmitted into the fold of the Catholic Church, Williamson’s controversial comments are not new. They are, in fact, reminiscent of the views purported by revisionist World War II historians like fellow Brit David Irving.

For voicing the unspeakable, Irving was arrested while visiting Austria in 2006 where Holocaust denial is illegal, serving a prison sentence there. Williamson, meanwhile, lost his job at a seminary in Argentina and has now been deported back to the UK.

But the ramifications of his doubting ways are far from over. Williamson today stands condemned by Jewish groups for stopping short of renouncing his comments, despite expressing regret for making them.

More significantly, he has come under fire from the Catholic Church. It would not come as a surprise if Williamson is excommunicated a second time for what could be construed as anti-Semitism, a stand that the Vatican may not want to be seen as condoning. He was formerly excommunicated in 1988 for participating in an unauthorised ordainment.

Still, die-hard propagators of Article 19 may argue that the Williamson’s case does not at all imply troubled waters. That may be so if it was the only incident that hints at disbelief in this belief of free speech without ramification. Unfortunately, that is not so.

In mid February, Dutch parliamentarian Geert Wilders was banned from entering the UK to screen his anti-Muslim film Fitna because it “would threaten community security and therefore public security” according to home secretary Jacqui Smith. Wilders is now considering suing Ms Smith at the International Court of the Hague for “blatant discrimination”.

Earlier that same month, BBC sacked its “roving reporter” Carol Thatcher from The One Show for using the pejorative term ‘golliwog’ to describe a black tennis player in the company of the show’s guests. Ironically, Ms Thatcher – like Wilders – also claims discrimination against her position as the daughter of former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher.

While free speech is at the heart of these episodes, it did not figure in their ensuing debates. Not in the magnitude that it did with the Prophet Muhammad cartoons controversy four years back that began in Europe and swept through the Muslim world.

Jyllands-Posten, the Danish newspaper that published twelve satirical caricatures of Prophet Muhammad, defended its move as an exercise in the freedom of expression. As Muslims worldwide take to the streets to protest, European newspapers reacted by republishing these cartoons on the pretext of defending the sanctity of the freedom of expression.

On the contrary, all is quiet on the Western front with Williamson’s Holocaust denial. This lacuna is striking considering both controversies had undermined a segment of humanity – Muslims with the Muhammad cartoons, and Jews with the Holocaust denial.

But before one can scream Islamophobia, it is perhaps useful to consider how some UK schools had avoided Holocaust and Crusades lessons for fear of offending Muslim students as it was widely reported last year.

Each of these cases suggests that free speech without repercussion is fast becoming a myth, if not already. There is always a backlash. Free speech is not quite universal as we would like it to be. It is nuanced.

Far from oppressing us, this realisation must surely free us from the naive stance that we have held on to so tightly since 1948. Perhaps it is time for world leaders to rethink Article 19 to better reflect ground realities. There is already precedence to justify the move. A clause that decries hate speech could be a good start.

Such an endeavour, if it sees the light of day, must also involve human rights scholars and activists. Most of all, it must embrace the sceptics who in turn needs to be reminded that to maintain a tight grip on the status quo is to disregard free speech as a double-edged sword. It cuts both ways.