Internet Censorship - Sense or Censorbility?

 

With Singapore’s reputation for censorship, it is not surprising to see that one of the largest aspects of new media, the Internet, is also subjected to it. Censorship in Singapore is mainly targeted at political, sexual, religious and racial issues. The Media Development Authority (MDA) regulates the three main Internet Service Providers (ISPs), blocking sites containing material they have classified as “mass impact objectionable”. In addition, the Ministry of Education blocks access to pornographic and similar objectionable material on its proxy servers.

An example to this would be the MDA’s blocking of websites such as Playboy and YouPorn and, many other sites that feature possibly offensive content. 

Government agencies in Singapore have also been known to use the act or threat of litigation against Internet content providers such as bloggers. A few examples of these have hit the news over the years:

·      In April 2005, blogger Chen Jiahao was forced to shut down his blog and make an apology for his apparent criticisms of government agency A*STAR, or face legal action.

·      In September 2005, 3 people were prosecuted under the Sedition Act for posting racial comments on the Internet.

And these are but a few cases of how the government has attempted to control content on the Internet.


However, is it practical or even necessary to control the content to the extent that the government has gone to?

Although a right in Singapore’s Constitution, freedom of speech has been held in a relatively low regard. George (2008), recognizes that:

“it is treated as a highly conditional right, which in effect means that it is not a right at all, but a kind of privilege or favor extended by the state to certain types of communication that meets whatever standards it chooses to impose. “ (¶ 1) and has even gone on to “offer a counter-intuitive view: socially irresponsible expression on the internet is precisely what should nudge Singapore towards a rights-based perspective on free speech.” (¶ 2).  

The problem with censorship on the Internet, is that the choices for practical policies have shifted from being between freedom and non-freedom, to being between freedom taken and freedom given, in recent times. This is largely due to the fact that even the government feels that censorship is no longer an option. In a Young PAP dialogue, Minister Mentor Lee said the following:

“Look, once upon a time, Singaporeans watched peep shows. You know, you pay 10 cents and you turn an old film in a box at Chinese wayangs. Today, they are going to Paris, they go to the Folies Bergere. I mean it doesn’t make sense any more. I said, ‘Let it go’. So they said, ‘No, we must stop this, stop that’. I said, ‘You either go with the world and be part of the world, or you will find that we become a quaint, a quixotic, esoteric appendage of the world’.” (Peh, 2007, The Straits Times, p. H5).

For those of us who do not understand “quaint”, “quixotic” and “esoteric”, I will break it down for you; he means that Singapore will remain old-fashioned, impractical and understood by few, if such censorship stays in place. Of course, we can see now that his words were meant in the context of a long-term trajectory as strict censorship has still been enforced by the MDA and its various branches in recent times.

Of course, I personally believe that a certain level of censorship should be maintained to ensure that youths are not mislead by information found readily on the Internet. However, there should be a limit as to how far this censorship goes. Government dogma in Singapore has removed the nation from the ongoing international discussions about the roles and limits of free speech, and has even portrayed free speech as selfish and irresponsible. This may be a detriment to our future, as the younger generations do not embrace free speech. “Why a detriment?”, you may ask, but we have to remember that civilized society is a working system of ideas. When free speech is not embraced, no new ideas will be put forward, and the cycle will carry on.

In conclusion, even though the Internet is an avenue for Singaporeans to express their views, much of what they say will remain visible on the Internet, and the possible (legal) repercussions of such will cause most citizens to think twice about what they post online, thus providing a serious impediment to the spreading of new ideas. As the saying goes, “What gets said in cyberspace remains in cyberspace.”, and I’m sure the rule applies to this blog post as well.