Freedom of speech – is a civil liberty. It is one of the basic rights in democracy. The basic rights are the common threads of a democracy. Freedom of speech is the concept of the inherent human right to voice ones opinion publicly without censorship or punishment.
Terrorism – in the modern sense, is violence, the treat of violence, or other harmful acts committed for political or ideological goals. Acts which are intended to create fear (terror) are perpetrated for an ideological goal (as opposed to a lone attack), and deliberately target or disregard the safety of non-combatants (civilians).Counter – terrorism or counterterrorism refers to the practices, tactics, techniques, and strategies that government, militaries. Police departments and other groups adopt in order to prevent or mitigate specific terrorist acts.Counterterrorism is not specific to any one field or organisation; rather, it involves entities from all levels from society. For instance, businesses have security plans and sometimes share commercials data with the government.The article by Joanne Miller is in fact an effort to regain the freedom of expression which many of us lost after 9/11. War on terror has directly affected the freedom to express, write, creativity and speech. Anything written about the terrorism is considered to be taken as an action on. “Attempts at the justification or glorification of terrorist acts that may incite further terrorist acts”UUN Security Council 2005 The above statement tells about the incitement. However, even indirect incitement is considered and goes against the counterterrorism laws. Anything that encourages terrorism is a crime. Whether it’s done directly or indirectly.There is no need for the message to directly encourage terrorism, and rather than having to be “likely” to result in criminal action, its enough that the message may “cause a danger” of such action. - Joanne Mariner.The problem arises because of the board language used while making a counterterrorism law. Rules are expansive. The objectivity is lost. And the punishment is given judgmentally. The government “over reacts” to the situation. And exploits the freedom of expression which indeed, is the cover stone and benchmarks of the modern European civilization. Their over reaction on the war of terror has escalated over a number of countries. A person carrying a map of a country may be accused of being a terrorist if he/she dose not have a solid point to prove him innocent. A person visiting an AL Qaeda website, or collecting information about it may be accused guilty. A young woman is now known as “lyrical terrorist” because of her poems that are written on terrorism. Isn’t this all just over rated? Over dramatized? Judgmental? What does ne have to say about Guantanamo bay? Innocent souls were being tortured as they were just considered as terrorist without any proof.
We do not totally blame the government. They have to take actions before the terrorist attacks actually take place. But there are these expansive rules that we blame at. By making such laws, government are doing more harm then good. Freedom of expression has to grain back. Freedom of speech is not something that can be easily controlled or stopped. It is everyone’s prior right to have the liberty to express them.
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This article is rephrased version of Joanne Mariner’s article, “How anti-terror laws threaten free speech”