An attack on the free press
Extinction Rebellion has dealt a great blow to the freedom of speech.
Late at night, on the 4th September, carrying on through the early hours of the 5th, groups of Extinction Rebellion (hereafter, ‘XR’) activists blocked access to printing sites of well-renowned national newspapers, such as the Daily Mail, The Sun, and The Telegraph (thankfully, Bournbrook Magazine has been unimpeded). This disruptive activity was carried out in retaliation against these publishing giants for not flooding their papers with hysterical XR propaganda from cover to cover.
Their motive, as expressed on placards and through Twitter hashtags, was to ‘free the truth’, meaning, in true Orwellian fashion, to prevent the expression, publication and dissemination of ideas that run contrary to XR orthodoxy. This was also an attack on the big bad wolf known as Rupert Murdoch, the billionaire media mogul, who they claim has brainwashed the population into climate denialism. There have been countless celebratory posts from the XR corner of social media congratulating one another for barely tickling the Murdoch superstructure.
Nevertheless, the attitude expressed by XR supporters is chilling.
What was drawn-up, organised and ultimately executed on that fateful night was a deliberate assault on our free speech rights.
Remember, Murdoch is only one man with a media empire spanning the globe; these newspapers have editors, writers and readers (millions of them) who all have minds of their own, so it is impossible to flick through a paper and then interpret that everyone’s view is telepathically locked to Murdoch’s brain. And with the readers, is it not entirely inevitable that they will frequently come across views they disagree with? This very magazine published an article written by a (now disbanded) student-run XR society (featured in the sixth issue).
The right to project one’s views as well as hear those of others is fundamental, paid for by blood and martyrdom over many centuries, and XR have performed the ‘Black Lives Matter’ organisation equivalent of defacing the Cenotaph, by spitting on the sacrifice of those who won all of us our freedoms.
Without freedom of thought and speech (interchangeable, in my view), problems can’t be identified and solution can’t be summoned in response, nor can you declare your grievances or criticise what you think is wrong with the world. This is XR’s right as well, and the time-tested argument for free speech is that the censors may, can, and (as history proves) will, out of fear and a desire for revenge, persecute those who were the first to introduce the censorship laws.
Severing the connection between the source of information and those receiving it is what dictatorships constantly administer so as to not alert the citizenry to the shortcomings (perhaps atrocities!) of the ruling regime. This will ignite opposition and resistance movements to spring up in the shadows, and they don’t want that to happen. Unlike Western democracies, where public officials reach the masses by scribbling their thoughts and immediate policy aims to the press in attempts to whip up support, but face unbearable scrutiny from all angles outside of their secluded column. In essence, the driving force of dictators is to do whatever they can to not ‘free the truth.’
Although this coordinated temporary blockade of the printing press was not carried out by a government, it was by a mob. If we have learnt anything from these past few movements, it is that mobs can also snatch our freedoms away and intimidate us just like any state apparatus, therefore, XR are as guilty as any government would be for violating fundamental human rights.
This attack on the free press should worry us all.
