Kill Dissent and Unleash Hate: Websites and Pages Disseminating Hate Speech Remain Very Much Active

By Farooq Sulehria

October 07, 2013

Kill dissent and unleash hate In an extremely controversial manner, the Sindh government has proposed a ban on half a dozen social media sites for three months. Pakistan, with 25-30 million people networked, has 6-10 million social media users.

It is hard to say if the Sindh government will prove belligerent enough to stick by its decision. It may change its mind in view of the widespread anger. However, one hopes the ban triggers a debate – long due – on the state’s role in policing the internet.

Unfortunately, the Musharraf regime as well as the democratic governments that succeeded it, have been similar in gagging social media. The ball was set rolling when, in March 2006; the Supreme Court directed the government to monitor the internet to block access to blasphemous content.

While the Musharraf regime banned BlogSpot when the lawyers’ movement picked up, the PPP government (2008-13) banned Facebook and Twitter besides a host of other websites and Facebook pages.

Once, even the website of the popular culture magazine, Rolling Stone, was blocked for criticising Pakistan’s military expenditure. In March 2012, PTA banned an internet site that specialises in delivering sex education to teenagers.

In a highly controversial move, in February last year, the National ICT R&D Fund invited tenders for deploying a national level URL Filtering and Blocking System. However, the idea was dropped following protests by netizens and human rights groups. The PPP’s most notorious attack on net freedom was the ban on YouTube in September 2012, which remains in place to this day.

The incumbent PML-N is hardly any better. Anusha Rehman, minister of state for IT, in her very first ominous statements to the press promised to purge the internet of all morally and religiously offensive content, using filtering technology to be procured at the cost of Rs2.7 billion.

In the guise of filtering blasphemous content and pornography, state authorities in Pakistan have actively blocked access to websites and Facebook pages hosting dissenting political, social and religious views and content.

Meanwhile, many websites, Facebook pages and Twitter accounts remain active disseminating hate speech, vilifying democratic institutions or calling for annihilation of Shias and Ahmadis. The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan remains active online as do anti-Shia outfits.

Second, the role of western companies selling technology or running social media sites deserves a mention. Despite their apparent commitment to democratic values, they are ready to sell censorship tools to states.

For instance, a senior Pakistani state official informed the Lahore High Court that the state has a covert working relationship with Facebook. Consequently, Facebook staff, working directly with Pakistan government officials, swiftly removes content that transgresses official content policy.

A case in point is the Roshni Facebook page. Roshni was not merely blocked by PTA but was also country restricted by Facebook in Pakistan.

Similarly, notorious surveillance software and dubious methods such as Net sweeper and DNS tampering have been employed to police the internet. NGOs such as Bolo Bhi and groups like ‘Bytes for All’, have protested but in vain. It seems there is a consensus among our ruling elites and global capital to stifle dissent in Pakistan.

Lastly, a national debate is needed to ascertain if puritan bureaucrats or opportunist politicians should be the ultimate judge and jury to arbitrarily define ‘morality’, ‘obscenity; and ‘blasphemy’. Most importantly, why has the fact that the internet is being policed been such a hush-hush affair! It is now time to raise all such questions.

Farooq Sulehria is a freelance contributor.

Source: http://www.thenews.com.pk/Todays-News-9-206740-Kill-dissent-and-unleash-hate

URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-media/kill-dissent-unleash-hate-websites/d/13862