Conspiracy to stifle freedom of expression on the Internet

 In this age of censorship, the world sees social media as the Messiah, and the general impression is that opinions on social networking sites can be freely communicated to the public. Contrary to many people's beliefs, I believe that we are rapidly losing our freedom of expression on social media as well.

India blocks 20 Pakistani YouTube channels and two websites

According to Article 19 of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, every person in the world has the right to freedom of expression and expression. This right includes the freedom to express one's opinion without interference and to obtain and provide information and ideas through any media and regardless of borders.

The UN member states are required to respect Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but the tragedy is that this is not happening. Every country seems to be worried about restrictions on freedom of expression in another country, but no one is willing to look into their own pockets. Hundreds of organizations around the world are working to protect freedom of expression, but their scale also suffers from double standards. Whether it is a country, an institution, an organization or an individual, everyone has set different standards of freedom of expression. Where freedom of expression is to be taught and where mysterious silence is to be observed is decided by face to face.

Countries stifle freedom of expression under the guise of "national security", institutions see economic interests as superior to freedom of expression, organizations develop their own "definition" of freedom of expression under the guise of funding Do

Now look at a recent incident. It so happened that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, one of the leaders of 37 countries restricting freedom of expression, shut down 20 YouTube channels and two websites in Pakistan, accusing them of Anti-India content is being uploaded on them.

According to the Indian government, the total number of followers of these channels running from Pakistan is 3.5 million and they were viewed a total of 500 million times.

Now read Article 19 of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights again and see if it is not called freedom of expression. The channels that millions of people in India (according to Indian government figures) listen to and receive information from have been shut down, depriving millions of people of access to information, in violation of Article 19 of the United Nations. There is a violation. India is now justifying the deprivation of freedom of expression to its people by selling "National Security".

Well, a country whose head is already among the top 37 countries in terms of restrictions on freedom of expression, this move by them is nothing new. The tragedy is that even a large organization like YouTube is putting its own interests ahead of its right to freedom of expression. It should be noted that YouTube has a policy of blocking content in their country at the request of governments which they do not want to show to their people. Each country has its own Internet Protocol (IP) and the YouTube administration blocks the delivery of the required content to that country's IP.

If we look at the issue of closure of 20 YouTube channels in Pakistan, it did not happen. In India, on the other hand, these channels were shut down. On the other hand, YouTube also showed urgency and, believing the propaganda of the Indian government to be true, removed these 20 channels from YouTube, which are liked by millions of people. YouTube has not only done this to Pakistanis, the Russians have also fallen victim to this double standard of YouTube. When the Russian-run news channel RT began broadcasting in German, Europe called it a threat. When RT launched its German-language channel on YouTube, YouTube removed it with objections and violated Article 19 of the United Nations as an organization.

Now the Russian government has issued a final warning to YouTube to restore the channel, threatening legal action if the channel is not restored. Experts say that in case of legal action, YouTube could face heavy fines.

Sadly, there is a mysterious silence on the abuse of Pakistani YouTubers. Recently, when it came to the implementation of an ordinance called the Media Development Authority in Pakistan, the organizations working for freedom of expression made such a fuss that if you write here, your eyes would fill with tears.

Newspapers in developed countries that could not tolerate a German-language YouTube channel published an article stating that if an ordinance called the Media Development Authority were passed, it would all be abolished, even YouTube channels would be shut down, and freedom of expression on social media. Will be strangled.