The individual is a free being. Free to do, say, wear, and eat whatever they want – or not. It’s up to them. But when “free” is placed next to “society”, “society” is the limit “free” bumps up against. In society, individuals are no longer alone in a no-rules wilderness. Individuals now live among family, neighbours, constituents, and tourists. While modern society strives to respect individual freedoms, living with other people around us means that there are things we can or cannot do and say if cordiality and peace is to be enjoyed by all. The question is not whether or not there should be restrictions on freedom of speech in free societies, but which restrictions need to be self-regulated, and which need to be imposed on and enforced by society. The freer the society, the more it depends on self-regulation. If society has to lay down the law, then society becomes way more restrictive.
Freedom of speech is important to us. We interact physically with the world using muscles that power our limbs to do stuff, but speech is how we interact with the world on an intellectual level – not as the world is, but rather how we want the world to be. And although different individuals want the world to be in different ways, speech is how we negotiate a shared reality that we all can live with. Speech is how we make others aware that things could be better for some of us, if everyone else could be a little more considerate or graciously give us some concession. Speech facilitates the ebb and flow of give and take that makes society function for the good of all, so society’s function depends on guaranteeing freedom of speech to every individual who lives in it.
Having to negotiate our rights and freedoms balanced against our responsibilities and restrictions is the price we pay for living in society. The idea that my freedom to swing my arms extends to the tip of your nose conveys a mutual trust that I can do what I want as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else. It goes the same for what we can and cannot say (out loud) within earshot of those who can hear us. What we say, after all, carries our intent towards others sharing our society. Words carelessly spoken, written, or otherwise conveyed to others intentionally or not could expose our desire to mean them well or ill, and whether we feel that they belong in society with us – or not. The more we are careless with our words, the more friction and tension we build between people in society leading to reduced trust provoking conflict and even violence. Whereas if we are more careful with what we say to people, we may not agree with them, but we also show our openness to approach the problem with understanding and respect, leading to more opportunities for peaceful resolution. We should also keep in mind that the larger the audience, the more we need to be tactful, if not cautious of what we say. Even if we think we are voicing our thoughts to the void, we may be within earshot of strangers who may come across our social media rants and misunderstand the joke, or whatever, and cause the whole thing to blow back in our faces.
While anarchies do exist today that resist any form of social regulation, their existence proves that people can self-regulate when they have to as they negotiate with each other on a context by context basis. The fact that few anarchies exist though shows how difficult it is to live that way, and that most people would rather not. Most other societies at least prescribe some form of rules of engagement governing how people negotiate and transact with one another in society. Rather than figuring out boundaries with every interaction, people are clear immediately how to conduct themselves even when engaging strangers. By imposing clear rules, society can, if necessary, deal with societal disruptions caused by miscommunication (which is not so severe) or by malicious speech (which is more serious) before it escalates beyond control.
How much control society imposes on freedom of speech varies. In some societies like North Korea, it is so tightly controlled that leadership is unquestionable and the citizens have no access to social media so for all intents and purposes, communication between citizens is almost purely functional, on a need-to basis. However, without lateral and vertical channels of communication, it is difficult for society to progress. Governance is based on assumption, some say delusion, while the citizens just have to live with their hardships, unable to expect or even imagine how their lives can improve.
Most societies function between these two extremes. Freer societies like the United States champion press and social media freedoms. There are age restrictions and parental warnings on harsh and explicit language use in entertainment media, and regulations regarding extreme hate speech, but otherwise the press can publish or broadcast what they want to attract and feed their audience base, and American social media and Late Night TV are free to poke fun at their government’s excesses (at least until their 47th presidential term which has been quite an historical anomaly so far). Such openness has kept the USA a model of what the world idealises as a free society, with the people having the power of speech to keep government overreach in check, again so far.
However, with practically every online enabled American voicing their dissatisfactions on social media at the same time, too many opinions are being aired without being listened to, and with people taking offence easily against even perceived slights, welcome to the world of Karens and cancel culture. The United States today looks like a mess in which everybody is shouting “I want…”, but creating an unfiltered cacophony in which no one is listening. Men’s rights conflict with women’s rights with LGBTQ+ rights. Politicians call for tougher law enforcement but people are calling out racial profiling. Politics has become partisan with both sides of the House accusing each other of working against the country’s interests. What’s resulted so far is a society that works not for all, but in favour of the loudest voices that currently wield the greatest political power. That’s privilege for some, ‘sucks to be me’ for others.
On the stricter side, Singapore wields the Prevention of Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act (POFMA) which regulates local press and social media discourse. The law does not cover inter-personal communication, but rather regulates against hate speech that threatens ethnic and religious harmony, and also curtails social media posts that cast aspersions against the state and its instruments without producing credible evidence. The rationale is that Singapore is a multi-ethnic and multi-religious society that is cemented together on mutual trust. Through historical precedent, these seams are fragile and society cannot function when that trust is broken. Likewise, trust in the leadership has been the backbone of Singapore’s progress and the fear is that if that trust is broken by malicious forces it becomes a survival issue for the country. While the pushback against this level of social control is that the people become afraid to voice legitimate dissent, criticism or whistleblowing, Singapore provides other channels of feedback that are more respectful and less rabble-rousing that the authorities are attentive to. Here, dialogue and civil debate is the way to go. Regulation is not about what is said, but rather how it is said and what the intentions are for saying it – it’s what’s worked so far.
Like it or not, society functions best for most people when freedom of speech is regulated though not overregulated. Communication at complex, abstract levels is one of humanity’s best assets that has helped us not only survive but thrive on this world. Freedom of speech gives us the ability to express our most abstract, creative thoughts, but it is inextricably tied to our obligation to listen to others and respond cooperatively. This is society at its best. Likewise, when we exercise our right to freedom of speech, we are at our best when we remember that the degree of freedom of speech we enjoy is inversely proportional to the number of audience members we are addressing. And because we live in an age of social media, we may have a larger audience that we intend to address.
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Inspired by Singapore-Cambridge GCE ‘A’ Level H1 General Paper (Paper 1) 2020 Question #11