In a democracy there is something more dangerous than absence of free speech: hate speech.
Speeches have built the world. Speeches have destroyed the world. Speeches have initiated people killing people; speeches have put a stop to people killing people. Speech is a double-edged sword. Those wielding it have power. In democracy there is something more dangerous than absence of free speech: hate speech.
What is free speech? In a democracy it is not necessary that everyone should sing the same song, said, S Rangarajan. Our constitution loudly and clearly declares that all citizens shall have right to freedom of speech and expression. Free speech is the right of every citizen under Article 19.1a. Free speech is once right to speak his or her mind, right to express one’s opinion, without negating the required reasonable restrictions.
I would believe that free speech takes us a little further, it is also one’s inner opportunity and prospect to speak out when another is vulnerable and in risk. Desmond Tutu, called as the ‘Conscience of South Africa’ articulated it EDITORIAL unambiguously, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”
What is hate speech? Indian books of law do not define hate speech, but the meaning of the term can be arrived at from many other offences such as sedition, promotion of enmity between different groups, deliberate and malicious act based on religion, sex, race, place of birth etc.
In a formal religious conclave at Haridwar, many speakers, with the ease of a well-planned program, voiced inflammatory and provocative speeches. They called for organized violence against Muslims and a ‘cleansing campaign’. The government just looked the other way. Most media establishments, either having sold out, or has been co-opted by the ruling government, did not care to cover sufficiently Haridwar hate speech episode; that too in a country which boasts about its 400 plus twenty four bar seven news channels. Where free speech withers hate speech sprouts.
The Thin Line Between Religious Speech and Hate Speech
The reading for the morning worship was the story of David and Goliath from the Bible. The description of how David overpowered Goliath and thus fought the Philistines was vivid and hair-raising. The preacher added more descriptions and intensity to the scene; narrating how we fought wars and won wars in the name of the Lord, forgetting what we are glorifying is war and brutality. The preacher, in well-meaning manner, repeated words like, fight and defeat, umpteen times in a 5 minutes long homily. Every side of a war vilifies the other race and people. It is easy to call the Philistines as barbarians; and say in the same breath that the Lord is with us. The Philistines, as a recognized race, is no more on the face of the earth. Does the Lord wipe a race out of the face of the earth?
The winners write history; that our ancestors happen to be the winners is no reason that those battles become just and pure. No war was just and pure. I am of the opinion that every violent text and imagery of the past and present must be removed from the present liturgy and worship. No images of violence bring about peace of mind and nation; it might fan our ego for a while.
Violent images, be it in the churches, temples, street corners, and as part of worship has an adverse effect on people, especially the young. What does the glorified figure of St. George with a spear, Lord Ram with bow and arrows, and the descriptive brutal battle scenes do to the psyche of a people? It is time religious practices get rid of violence even if it is passive, and integrally so close to a said religion. When such spirituality, gets coupled with ‘them against us’ ideology, religious speeches become or border on hate speech.
May be it is an extreme position, but I gather courage to say, that the world still has peace and sanity because a good number of people do not go to churches, temples, and mosques to hear the extreme religious leaders preach, and to protect their gods. Institutional religious leaders are vulnerable and easily get charged when speaking about the battles we have won in the name of god.
Here is a curious appendix. The Philistines were portrayed in the Bible as a crude and warlike race. Later they were portrayed in literature as disdainful of intellectual or artistic values, and one uninformed in a special area of knowledge; in short, people unaffected by modernity, and are anti-intellectual. I have my apprehensions: are the tables changing? Are those who won wars in the name of God against the Philistines, and other religions who have similar claims, turning out to be Philistines themselves: people who are unaffected by knowledge and modernity.
Speechless Solutions
The solution is including the other with us. Considering our religious, linguistic, and cultural diversity we live in a country of ‘others’. Hardly 10% of the population is homogenous. We differ on multiple fronts. That places on us an added responsibility. Talk, and act as if the other is able to hear you and see you. Should there be deeds and conversations that are not comfortable to the other? Open up our religiously and socially exclusive conversations and literature to groups who do not belong with us on various grounds. Let everyone has the possibility of hearing it, reading it, and ask intelligent questions aloud. Folks who parade their superiorities, and border on hate speech in their condescending discourses will be compelled to maintain reasonable and intelligible constrain. People who hide behind human made exclusivities and sectarian ideologies for monitory, political, and other gains would have to lose their ground. Nothing changes us as fast and radically as failures.
One of the gifts of modernity is its many subcultures. One may traditionally and inescapably be a Hindu, Muslim, Christian, or Indian, Pakistani, American, or high caste, low caste, outcaste; and all these groupings, as researchers observe, perhaps being trapped by the ghost of the undoable past, have a strong inclination to be violently and exploitatively exclusive. Humans being social animals cannot live in isolation; they need society and organisational existence for their survival and wellbeing. Sensible, genuine, and well-meaning people are turning their back on deep-rooted, despotic, and exclusive religious affinities, cultural similarities, and social kinships; not for an individualistic and isolated life far in the uninhabited parts of the world, but for less exclusive and less exploitative, subcultures. Broad human groupings evolved and are ever evolving around one’s, hobbies, profession, age, art, political and social freedoms, intellectual and philanthropic pursuits.
A couple of months back, during the interval between second and third Covid-19 wave, I had gone with a Hindu friend of mine to a café in Bangalore. As we entered the cafe there already was a large group of Gen Z people playing some game, chattering loudly in Gen Z lingo. They unambiguously were not people from a single religious or linguistic group. We ordered coffees, and then some Italian pasta. My friend and I got engrossed in talking about how the young writers’ club, that he was part of, booming, and how they spend their weekends in meaningful discussions and interactions. They even had a Covid outreach WhatsApp group to care for people who may need help. Interrupting our discussions, the warm pastas arrived. As the waiter departed, wishing us buon appetito, to my surprise, my friend bowed his head in silence for a few seconds, I kept the fork I had hurriedly gathered back on the table, and as I sat looking at him, I too thought of God the provider, farmers who have toiled behind the vegetables and grains that has become my food, and a passing remembrance of thousands who can’t afford a meal today. As we were leaving the café, there arrived a dozen or more of loud motorbikes, carrying riders clad in biker’s jackets. Obviously they were a bikers’ group, come to plan for their upcoming adventure, or perhaps to discuss their next outreach programme. I said bye to my friend, and as I waited for an auto rickshaw, I was reminiscing the slice of contemporary humanity I had encountered in the café.
These subcultures are motivated by greater and more genuine purposes. They are fluid, they are not brutally exclusive of any caste, class or gender; people are born into it or introduced into it, and grow out of it. Most importantly they do not have to pitch themselves against the other. They need not thrive on the ‘us against them’ creed. Thus definitely less room for hate speech.
Dominant and institutional religious and cultural structures and configurations, in which we have lived historically, with perhaps a few exceptions, are neck deep in caste, class, power and gender equations and discriminations. Perhaps these structures must go, but I know not how. Our kids must go to schools and colleges, not to gather with their exclusive kind, or to hear only about their religion and cultural dominance and importance; but to discover the other, perhaps to be part of new socially meaningful groups. Some institutions nobly claim that we welcome all groups of people to the portals of our institution, but do we ever seriously and genuinely meet them? Or they meet our needs of having numbers on our campus? One day a lady came to meet and learn from Jiddu Krishnamurti, an Indian philosopher and writer. Being preoccupied with his work Jiddu refused to meet her. But she insisted to meet Jiddu. Finally, Jiddu accepted. She came in. She began talking, and she went on talking about herself and her ideas. Jiddu found no gap to contribute anything. Finally, again, when she got up to leave for she was running late, she said, “I am glad to have met you’. Jiddu smiled. Did she really meet Jiddu? Institutions must not be one-way talking grounds, but must become fluid and nonthreatening meeting grounds. Remember schools having green, red, blue, yellow houses for student activities, that is a great initiative because that value neutral groups give them a chance to think out of the ghettos they are born into. New wine needs new wine skins, said the Palestinian wanderer over two thousand years ago.
Free speech holds a key. If our religions, institutions, and families are struggling to be meaningful, just and noble, I challenge you to check, they would have long lost appreciation and possibility for free speech. One of the keys to get back on track is to have the possibility of one of the fundamental constitutional rights – free speech. That perhaps will also save us from debasing ourselves to the realm of hate speech.
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