Features
Red lining; snipping off; banning
History of censorship
I read with interest a long Britannica article in Internet which traces the history of the banning of the written and spoken word. All countries have descended to censorship, very markedly Russia and China. During Confucius’ time (551-479 BC), deference to elders and authority was insisted upon and so those who broke these norms were censored and punished.
A detailed account was given of censorship within the Grecian Civilization – 900 BCE to 600 CE. Although Greece initiated the earliest of democracies where citizens ruled the country and open debate was encouraged, censorship came in when a refusal to conform arose, outwardly to recognized worship. The community subjected such irreligious persons to hardships.
If a person spoke improperly, legal sanctions were forthcoming. Athens particularly, more than other States of the Grecian Empire, allowed freedom of speech, particularly political. However we have the case of one of its most wise and freely speaking philosophers – Socrates – being tried, convicted and executed in 399 BC; accused of corrupting youth mainly because he did not acknowledge gods and expressed it.
Rome had its golden times when anybody could speak openly in the period between the leadership of Nerva (30-98 CE) and Marcus Aurelius (121 -180 CE). Tacitus wrote that a citizen could hold and defend whatever opinions he wished to.
Christendom and the rise in power and influence of the Catholic Church brought in severe censorship and excommunication from the Church. Consider what happened to Galileo Galilei of Pisa, Italy, 1564-1642. He declared “And yet it moves”; it being the Earth. The Christian and European belief was that Earth was at the centre of the universe and therefore stood still. Galileo was convinced that model was wrong, although he could not prove it. He was censored but punishment was comparatively mild. His book was banned; and he was sentenced to light penance and imprisonment, commuted to ‘villa arrest’.
Medieval Europe where religion closely influenced politics had witch hunts and the trial of Joan of Arc and her being burnt at the stake. The Age of Enlightenment -17th and 18th centuries – ushered in a freer time.
A great landmark in freedom from censorship was the promulgation of, and ratification of the US Constitution in 1791. “Congress shall make no laws respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for redress of grievances.”
Very much in mind is George Orwell’s 1949 novel Nineteen Eighty Four with reference to the future of the world according to what was prevalent in Russia where suppression and government prying reached a crescendo to the point of making human life worthless living.
Also Oscar Wilde (1854-1900), Irish writer, clever wit, Victorian celebrity for his elegant appearance, was banned and hounded out of Britain by government decree in 1895 at the height of his theatre success. He was censored for his behavior – ‘gross indecency’ consequent to being reported as indulging in homosexual acts, though consensual. He moved to live in a hotel in France and died at age 47 of an infected ear causing meningitis.
The most infamous and ludicrous act of governments’ censorship was banning D H Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover for explicitness in description and obscenity of language– the use of the f word which is so freely used now by even kids. The UK brought a case against publisher Penguin in 1928. The US banned the book in 1929 and many other countries followed. Ban was lifted in the US in 1959 and UK in 1960.
You will note I have touched on only early Western censorship; nothing on Indian or Sri Lankan. My reference was the Britannica article, and matters I had in mind. I am not competent to write about early censorship in my country and India.
Latest Indian Ban
The above was by way of introduction to the subject of censorship and banning. My main story is centered on Arundathi Roy who two weeks ago was charged by Indian government announcement and may face imprisonment. “She is accused of provocative speech and promoting enmity between different groups merely for comments made in 2010 that questioned the Indian Government’s claims to the disputed, restive region of Kashmir. But the real reason she is targeted now – 13 years later – is surely her courageous criticism of the intolerance and violence unleashed under Mr Modi. People like her are among India’s greatest assets because they stand for truth and decency, but they are being cast as enemies of the state.
India is devouring its best and brightest.” The woman writer in a recent New York Times (apologies for not noting down her name) went on to say: “Charges against Ms Roy are typically absurd. She has been a voice for truth, tolerance and sanity in India for decades. Her books and essays record the utter apathy of the post-independence ruling class as India descends into the chaos of Mr Modi’s right wing politics. Jailing Ms Roy would be not unlike America imprisoning a writer of the moral stature of Toni Morrison or James Baldwin.”
Added in the article are these facts. Since 2014 when Modi came to power, the Hindu nationalist mob has targeted Muslims, students, activists, opposition politicians and Dalits. We in Sri Lanka have had less mob violence except among the drug mafia, but the police have been increasingly using strong arm tactics against protesters, peaceful though they be. However, we will never forget the white vans during Mahinda – Gotabaya Rajapaksa regime and the number of journalists who were kidnapped, assaulted, killed too, and one woman journo whose life was in danger and was spirited away. She dared to bare MIG business and quoted word for word an interview she conducted.
Going back to the latest and best known censored person in India, Arundathi Roy, in September this year she won the prestigious European Essay Prize for, as the jury stated: “Using the essay as a form of combat, analyzing fascism and the way it is being structured.”
In 1997 Arundathi Roy won the Booker Prize for her first novel God of Small Things. She stopped writing fiction and concentrated on political protests such as against the five dams of the Damodar Valley Corporation which dislocated hundreds of poor families. She undertook lecture tours in the US and did not mince her words criticizing the host country. In 2017, after a lapse of 20 years fiction writing, she published her second novel Ministry of Utmost Happiness in which almost a quarter of the book is a political diatribe on the suffering of the people of divided Kashmir. Her collection of essays she titled My Seditious Heart.
Thus it appears that in addition to other negatives like religious conflict and Hindu supremacy in India, censorship and banning of criticism of government is coming in strong.
Over here
The most pertinent question to us is: Are we imitating or following Big Brother across the Palk Straits? This burning question is consequent to a most troublous, ominous move of President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s SLPP dominant government in presenting on October 3 in Parliament the ‘Online Safety Bill’. The first question that surfaced in my mind was: whose safety is being ensured? Not the general public’s by any means. The government is bringing in draconian restrictions to safeguard itself.
According to the Bill, “A commission of five individuals appointed by the President will be empowered to block any social media account, prosecute, fine and even imprison individuals.”
Now if this Bill is not the forerunner, harbinger and warning sign of censorship, what is? It has been protested against. It must not be allowed to become an Act.
Postscript
BBC News on Wednesday November 1 announced the first ever Artificial Intelligence Safety Summit convened by leading AI nations, businesses, civil society and AI experts, to discuss the global future of AI and to share understanding on the risks it poses.
On October 15 in this column I wrote about AI. What caught my fancy in the news of the Summit starting on November 1 is that the venue is Bletchley Park, Buckinghamshire. Here it was that in1935 crypto analyst Alan M Turing and other experts were closeted and given the task of decrypting WW II German intelligence messages. Turing built a machine to do the decoding which, it is said to be, the forerunner of all computers.
His inventive idea of “a machine of limitless memory, scanner that moves symbol by symbol reading what it finds and writing further symbols was the first beginning of AI.” The AI Summit venue is so appropriate and an indirect sign of respect to those earliest in the field of AI though they had not even the use of a computer then. Turin’s theoretical design, vague though it was, is accepted as the first original forerunner of artificial intelligence.