Freedom of expression has been a heavily debated fundamental right for years. Most constitutions explaining this right have some loopholes which make us question: Where is the line?
Ideally, the line should be hate speech. But, how do we categorize hate speech? Are controversial opinions directed towards a specific community regarded as hate speech? Does criticizing the government mean risking the state’s sovereignty and security? How does one go about expressing their thoughts and opinions on a public platform without offending anyone or by being truly neutral? For years, many public figures have faced violent attacks and threats because they voiced their opinion against some grand narrative or social norms like religion, the government, social injustice, and so on. A recent addition to this list is Salman Rushdie.
On 12 August 2022, in New York, Salman Rushdie was attacked while attending an event at the Chautauqua Institution. He sustained severe wounds. The famed author was stabbed in the liver and is likely to lose an eye, according to Andrew Wylie, his literary agent. He also likely suffered severed arm nerves and liver damage. Fortunately, he is reportedly recovering as of 26 August 2022. The assailant, Hadi Matar, a 24-year-old New Jersey resident of Lebanese heritage, is in police custody. It was said that he was surprised Rushdie had survived the attack. This attack was prompted by the ongoing animosity that some Muslims still harbor toward his 1988 book The Satanic Verses.
The assassination attempt on Rushdie, 34 years after the publication of his contentious book The Satanic Verses, stunned the globe. Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa in 1989 offering a bounty for the murder of Rushdie. As a result, Rushdie spent years in hiding. His book’s Norwegian and Japanese translators were killed in 1991. Although the fatwa against him was never lifted, he persisted in supporting and standing up for people who speak truth to power. The fact that he was attacked as he was getting ready to deliver a speech on the significance of the United States providing shelter for authors and other exiled artists is highly symbolic.
There has been a lively and widespread discussion on the democratic right to freedom of expression and the legality — or lack thereof — of restrictions in matters of religious faith following the fatwa and the decision to ban the book by several countries including Bangladesh, Sudan, Sri Lanka, and India. Despite being in danger and facing threats, Rushdie did not step down and believed in the power of his words. When he came out of hiding he said, “What one writer can make in the solitude of one room is something no power can easily destroy”, at a press conference organized in 1998.
There is little doubt that the restrictions placed on free expression in many countries, including India and Bangladesh, have frequently been arbitrary and anti-democratic. To give one example, the Indian government once decided that VS Naipaul’s book An Area of Darkness was too critical of the State and hence banned it. This can be seen as a clear violation of the freedom of expression because a book being banned for criticizing the government appears quite totalitarian. It is important to keep in mind that countries like India are not banana republics, where criticism—no matter how scathing—can be seen as a danger to the integrity and sovereignty of the country.
Similarly in Bangladesh, bloggers being attacked and assassinated is nothing unheard of. In separate attacks in 2015, five secular bloggers were assassinated. Each instance made the news and caused indignation, but the terrible toll persisted for months. Bloggers and secular activists who publicly opposed religion or supported atheism have come under threat since a hit list of secularists was published in 2013 by extreme Islamist organizations. Avijit Roy, a US-based author of Bangladeshi descent, was one of these bloggers. He was leaving a book festival in the capital city and was attacked with machetes. The blogger’s writings on religion had infuriated hardliners. It was one of a string of attacks on secular figures that were attributed to Islamist militants.
Even after years when the immediate threat to Rushdie looked to have subsided, Islamist fanatics, both Shia and Sunni, have always represented a threat to free speech. The 2015 assassination of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh, the 2015 attacks at the Charlie Hebdo offices in Paris, the 2020 execution of Samuel Paty – are all examples of such extremism. However, it would be wrong to assume that individuals exerting their freedom of expression face threats from only extremists. Due to the rising fear of terrorism and its unfortunate religious associations, this assumption is easy to make. Country governments have also been notorious for impeding their citizens’ freedom of speech.
In 2016 a number of musicians, puppeteers, and other artists in Spain were arrested for criticizing the government and police. While many audiences were disturbed, these artists remained strong in stance and proved that the government and police would go to extreme lengths to hide their failure and discrimination. During the COVID-19 worldwide lockdown, many countries imposed restrictions on their citizens from sharing information about how governments were handling Covid-19 protocols. This prompted the spread of misinformation and the persecution of individuals who were documenting the reality on social media. Governments, in order to shelter their progress and hide their mishandlings from the international eye, obstructed the people’s freedom of expression along with their right to information.
As the days go by, it seems that the world becomes more claustrophobic for anyone deviating from the mainstream line of thought.
The actions of these governments and extremist groups against freedom of expression are authoritative in nature – they either use fear and coercion to silence these individuals or opt for direct assassination. The attack on Rushdie serves as a reminder that freedom of speech is heavily doctored, be it on public platforms, through art forms, journalism etc. His career is inspirational for people today striving to voice their distaste for the state and undoubtedly, will pave the path for artists, writers, musicians, activists, and journalists to keep illustrating the horrific realities they experience in their rawest forms.