A leading human rights journalist described the UK as having an ‘ambivalent relationship’ with free speech at a campus debate last week.
The editor-at-large for magazine ‘Index on Censorship’ Martin Bright spoke his views at the campus event led by a panel of students.
He said: “I think the truth is that when you’re looking at freedom of expression in the UK, we’ve always had a little bit of an ambivalent relationship with freedom of expression in this country.
“We don’t really need to have a rose-tinted attitude to the way things were in the past, I think the British government’s never been particularly open.”
The UK’s restrictions on free speech only speaks to a wider issue faced world-wide.
LJMU has a long-standing relationship with the ‘Index on Censorship’ publication, with a student from the University’s journalism department interning at the magazine every year.
At the event, this year’s intern and editorial assistant of the magazine Connor O’Brien spoke on the role Index on Censorship plays in free speech.
cover created by Charlotte Crawford.
He said: “Index is a magazine with a global readership started in the 1970s with a focus on providing a voice to the dissident writers, persecuted artists, scholars.
“We work as a magazine as an NGO providing aid to these people.”
The magazine creates a platform for those who are not able to exhibit their right to free speech.
“Platforming through Index is also a massive thing for people say in Iran or Eastern Europe. In Belarus, a lot of Belarusian reporters are facing arrest.
“In Venezuela at the minute a lot of people are getting arrested for just reporting on the government, so it’s incredibly important that these peoples’ stories are being told,” Mr O’Brien said.
The debate gave eye opening insight into the innerworkings of free speech and how that can be platformed or censored.
