The Pakistani Spectator

To what degree are we free to speak our minds in the current pretence of Pakistani democracy.We certainly cannot draw cartoons of the one prophet but why are the Muslims not enraged when the same satirical caricatures appears in newspapers and on the internet depicting other prophets. Aren’t they a part of the religion? Why then are the Pakistani Muslims not shouting voices over a loudspeaker whilst breaking things. What freedom of speech holds with it, in this country, is a price tag. A price tag that may, in case of Sulman Rushdie, lead to numerous death threats or futwahs. Minorities live in fear that if they speak out, they’d be dead. And what gives people rights to fallaciously try these very people under the shariah law or the Hudood Ordinance.

Worst of all, the emergency rule that left the country in darkness preceding the February 2008 preliminaries was a downright denial of this freedom to the common man much less the media but in certain aspects, I see the Muslim attitude in Pakistan to be far more tolerable than in the West. We have broken the norms of our culture by introducing taboo topics to the society - just take a look at ‘Khuda Ke Liye’ or ‘Khamosh Pani’. Is it time that every man or woman be given full rights to express themselves freely or shall shackles be a never-ending dream? How much free would we be under a new government? None can answer. None, but the free.