Last episode I drew Muhammed.
This was not out of religious intolerance
or because I wanted to be offensive.
It was because censorship is wrong.
If you don’t think it’s okay to draw Muhammed,
then YOU don’t do it.
But do not take away other people’s rights
to their freedom of speech.
Because Free Speech is the bedrock of all
liberties.
Free speech is the people’s defence against
bad government.
Politicians who err should be subjected to
unfettered criticism.
When critics are censored it helps authoritarian
regimes justify their injustice and intolerance.
As Nobel Prize winner Amartya Sen pointed
out “no democracy with a free press ever
endured famine”.
Freedom of speech is the spearhead of understanding,
taboos the enemy of understanding.
When China’s government orders economists
to offer optimistic forecasts, it guarantees
its own policy makers will be ill-informed.
When we can no longer freely to discuss amongst
each other it results in no longer understanding
our fellow human beings and the world around
us.
It will lead to misinformation and mismanagement,
disunity and suppression.
Free speech is the engine on which science
runs.
Imagine if never Galileo questioned the Church’s
belief that the Earth was in the centre of
the universe.
Imagine if Isaac Newton was never allowed
to create his theory on gravity?
What if Einstein was forbidden from creating
his theory of general relativity?
Do we truly want to live in a world where
our ideas are not questioned?
Where someone we’ve never met tells us what
to say, what to feel, and what to think?
Freedom of speech is the right to sometimes
say things that other people don’t like.
It is accepting that, even though you don’t
agree with someone, you still allow them to
say it.
No person, no religion, no idea is so important
that we can usurp the rights of another human
being.
Of course, there are limits to freedom of
speech: child pornography, bullying, or shouting
to an angry mob outside a synagogue should
never be allowed.
Freedom of speech is about expressing your
opinion, not about hurting people or inciting
violence.
Answer objectionable speech with more speech.
Win the argument without resorting to force.
And never try to silence views you disagree
with.
Some of you might say “what is stopping
anyone from discrimination?
What if people could once again pick up the
Nazi flag?
What if we could once again openly discriminate?”
Freedom of Speech defends itself.
When you are racist, sexist, or homophobic
there will be a backlash of those pointing
out how bad discrimination is.
In the USA, black people were discriminated
based on the colour of their skin.
This led to millions of people speaking out
against discrimination.
Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks used their
freed speech to combat hatred.
In India, Gandhi used his freedom of speech
to bring to light the immoral actions of the
British to the world.
He fought the British hatred with peaceful
speech and in doing so liberated his homeland.
We must be allowed to say offensive things
because at one point the notion of equal rights
for all ethnicities was offensive, the notion
of equal rights for women was once offensive,
and the notion of equal rights for LGBT people
is still offensive to many.
When the first speech censored, the first
thought forbidden, the first freedom denied.
It changes us all irrevocably.
The first time anyone’s freedom is trodden
on.
We are all damaged.
Surrendering our freedom of choice, usurping
the rights of another, submitting ourselves
to censorship.
That is true evil and we can never submit
to evil!
Do you agree with me?
Is censorship this bad, or do you have a different
opinion.
Let me know in the comments below.
I will be reading each and every comment.
And if you liked this video, don’t forget
to like and subscribe for more videos.
