\u201cNo regrets over Prophet\nMuhammad Cartoons\u201d \u2013 that\u2019s how arrogant and presumptuous a statement made by Charlie Hebdo’s director Laurent Sourisseau at the\n“Tribunal de Paris” courthouse in Paris on 9 September 2020 recently.\nWhat he regretted, on the contrary, was \u201cto see how little people fight to\ndefend freedom. If we don’t fight for our freedom, we live like a slave and we\npromote a deadly ideology,\u201d he lamented.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This\nis how some people view \u201cfreedom\u201d of expression or press freedom, and unfortunately\nin today\u2019s so-called \u201ccivilised\u201d world, Sourisseau is not the only one who\nholds this belief. There are many the likes of him or those who support his absurd\ncomplete freedom of expression. They are, if not insane, perhaps foolish. There\nis no such thing as \u201cabsolute freedom\u201d in any part of the world and do not ever\nattempt to fight or defend such an absolute nonsense notion. Even in a country\nlike Norway which practices the most freedom, a person was sentenced to prison\nfor hate speech by the Norwegian Supreme Court on 12 April 12 2018 for crossing\nthe line of freedom of expression. Limitations to expression include\ndefamation, hate speech, and deliberate contempt of religion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Recently,\nour country has just celebrated its 63rd anniversary of our Independence from\nthe British and soon the Malaysia Day. During the colonial period, our\nforefathers suffered a lot because there was no freedom at all. The few old\nfolks who have still survived until this day are able to narrate the ordeal the\nrakyat<\/em> had undergone during the occupation period. But we are a\nsovereign country now and we have made tremendous progress and peaceful life\nliving together in this multi-racial and multi-religious country. Regrettably,\nin spite of the harmony, there are always a certain quarters of people who do\nnot appreciate the peace and harmony that we enjoy. They tend to cross the\nboundary of freedom of expression by playing up sensitive issues that could\nspark anger and provoke others. The bloody tragedy of 13 May 1969 should always\nbe in the backdrop of our mind when it comes to discussing sensitive issues. Unfortunately,\nthose who had witnessed the tragedy are quite elderly by now, or perhaps some\nhave already gone to meet their Lord. The youngsters of today have no idea what\nhad actually transpired then in 1969, for they were not born yet. Some of them\ndo not even bother to read up on the history of their own country and take\nlessons from it, not knowing that history repeats itself. <\/p>\n\n\n\n With\nthe advent of the social media, people turn to it to express their opinion and\ncriticisms. Just by a few strokes on the keyboards, they have exercised their\n\u201cfreedom of expression\u201d and their opinion can then be accessed worldwide. In doing so, some have gone overboard by not\njust giving their opinion but also insulting or defaming others, making hate\nspeeches and derogatory remarks towards other races, religions or languages.\nSometimes, they channel hateful remarks and statements not only to the leaders of our country such as\npoliticians, but also to the King or Queen who are above politics and by right should be\ngiven full respect, honour and dignity just like one respects one\u2019s own\nparents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n According\nto Malaysia Crime Prevention Foundation (MCPF) senior deputy-chairman, Tan Sri\nLee Lam Thye, there is no specific law to regulate hate speech in this country\nto date, though there are general provisions that address certain elements of\nhate speech. He has proposed that \u201cMalaysia should emulate other countries\nwhich have introduced specific laws to tackle such issues. The United Kingdom,\nfor instance, has the Racial and Religious Hatred Act 2006 which makes it an\noffence to incite hatred against a person on the grounds of religion.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Dealing\nwith this issue is very delicate and we need to strike a balance for we also\nneed to comply with Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights\n(UDHR) and Article 10 of the Federal Constitution of Malaysia on freedom of\nopinion and expression. So far, the government invokes Section 233 of the\nCommunications and Multimedia Act (CMA) and laws such as the Sedition Act 1948,\nthe Peaceful Assembly Act 2012 and Section 504 and 505 of the Penal Code and\nThe Security Offences (Special Measures) Act 2012 (SOSMA) to charge those who\nmake hate speeches, apart from Section 298A of the Penal Code that states it is\na crime to incite disharmony, disunity and enmity on the grounds of religion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However,\nafter 63 years of independence and living together, whether we have a Racial and Religious Hatred Act or not, it\nis not an issue. More importantly, by now we should be able to understand each other better,\nloving each other like brothers and sisters of humanity\u2014even though of\ndifferent faiths\u2014like Imam al-Nawawi RA says in his work, the 40 Hadiths (Arba\u2019in\nal-Nawawiyah<\/em>), commenting on a Prophetic tradition \u201cto love your brother\nwhat you love for yourself\u201d. A self-censorship and self-restraint attitude that\nprevents us from making any hateful statements or defame and insult others,\nwhich would eventually incite disharmony, disunity and enmity among various\nracial and religious adherents is perhaps one of the ways to manifest our love\ntowards our brothers and sisters of humanity. That is true freedom, freedom\nfrom hatred, enmity and suspicion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u201cNo regrets over Prophet Muhammad Cartoons\u201d \u2013 that\u2019s how arrogant and presumptuous a statement made by Charlie Hebdo’s director Laurent Sourisseau at the “Tribunal de Paris” courthouse in Paris on 9 September 2020 recently. What he regretted, on the contrary, was \u201cto see how little people fight to defend freedom. If we don’t fight for…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_analytify_skip_tracking":false,"_wpzoom_pinterest_image_url":"","_wpzoom_pinterest_hidden_image":"0","_wpzoom_pinterest_description":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[139],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-new-straits-times","category-139","description-off"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ikim.gov.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ikim.gov.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ikim.gov.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ikim.gov.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/31"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ikim.gov.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28089"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ikim.gov.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28089\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ikim.gov.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ikim.gov.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ikim.gov.my\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}