Don't Imprison Voltaire
by Nayantara Sahgal, Outlook India, India - India is a mini-world with a multicultural population where people don't always see eye to eye. There should be room for competing ideas in a democracy—but if I cannot disagree with someone without vandalising his house or burning his book or bashing his head in, then this method of banning, unacceptable to me, amounts to terrorism.
Comments (1)
In India and everywhere, society is in peril when spaces for competing ideas are banned. This writer’s analogy to the realm of the aesthetic is a great one. She writes, “in a huge multicultural country, someone's sentiments are bound to be hurt by something written or said or done by someone else. I believe it is absolutely necessary to hurt sentiments if the reason for doing so is the advancement of knowledge, or the betterment of the human condition. If we had been afraid to hurt sentiments, we would still be burning widows.”
Down with the voices “from the lunatic fringes, by people who claim to speak for many.” Great post!
Posted by Kate Daniels | June 26, 2008 7:50 AM