Addressing disruption and upheaval

Something you learn early when you’re in the press freedom/free expression business is that explaining what you spend more than half your professional life doing is almost as difficult as managing the main tasks at hand.

As a branch of the wider pursuit of human rights, there tends to be some confusion over specific features of the assignment, even by others engaged in related vocations.

There is also a mistaken belief that because much of the redress relies upon enlightened legislation, activism should remain the exclusive preserve of lawyers and jurists.

The fact, though, is that too many of these professionals often display an acute unfamiliarity with human rights in the real world or recognise a role for themselves in ensuring their preservation.

This is not a backhand slap in the context of a legal fraternity here that bears the burden, imposed by a few, of a reputation based on habitual angling for lucrative state briefs and/or cannibalistic fees.

It is to suggest that despite an apparent glut in supply, there are precious few attorneys consistently occupied with the pursuit of human rights as a moral and professional obligation, and who favour the potentially lucrative status quo over costly disruption.

It has thus been left to practitioners of other crafts and directly affected communities to lead the charge. Yet, even so, there are numerous points of contention among us. Over the years, activists in other fields and I have often debated the cross-cutting nature of relations between wider social justice advocacy and freedom of expression/press freedom.

It is inconceivable that, despite some media malpractice and ill-informed commentary in the public space, a commitment to freedom of expression can ever be at variance with the universality and indivisibility of the rights of all human beings.

Yet, “freedom of expression” is mockingly parenthesised by those who find it hard to believe that in today’s world, it provides a context to almost every major social concern. Also, because it is routinely ill-defined, a loose conglomeration of all expression, including those designed to cause harm is often included.

It’s good to note the foundational Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the nature of social transactions involving those who seek, receive and impart expression. Put that way, accompanying press freedom includes not only the media, but the ability to seek out their content and to acquire it.

So, last week, I was in Costa Rica at an event entitled: “Information Literacy in the Age of Disruption” and I was there as an advocate for press freedom and free expression. Someone wondered aloud: What the hell is going on???!!!

As with today’s preamble, there is no easy way to explain this, unless you have been following what has been happening … to you … in today’s world. We are currently negotiating a process of upheaval and disruption in all facets of public life.

To focus on just one point, it is a requirement of our society’s battles with misinformation and disinformation (the former largely unwitting, the latter deliberately harmful) that we tailor our responses in a manner that is compliant with the promotion of more, not less, free expression.

Media and information literacy, or the implanting of critical thinking norms in interpreting media and other content, provides a free speech compliant approach.

Even so, Article 19 provides for exceptions. These include lawful derogations (and here is where many battles are fought) to secure the rights or reputations of others, and for the protection of national security, public order, or public health or morals.

The “public health” exception is particularly noteworthy in today’s pandemic world. Yet even this is insufficient justification to stifle scepticism – however deceptive or ill-informed. Big Tech platforms apply their own standards. We need to set our own.

Sadly, activists of the Americas assembled in San Jose last week somehow skipped the “disruption” part because there was just so much else to talk about. But I had contended that it was the most important sub-theme item of all.

The pandemic, political and economic chaos, and the end-stage dynamics of our planet have combined to disrupt everything. Here is where the rights of average everyday humans enter the picture in ways never before imagined.

If we were to err, though, it would have to be on the side of freedom and not prohibition. Media and information literacy provides a long-term avenue to achieve this. By itself, it can be as disruptive, albeit in a positive manner, as the phenomena it is meant to address.