Censorship Ethical Issues

Censorship is an interesting system because of its variety and versatility. Some governments use it sparingly to protect state secrets and others heavily regulate all forms of the media and internet to try to control the people and what they see. To censor something means to “examine in order to suppress or delete anything considered objectionable” (Merriam – Webster). Censorship has been going on since 399 BC, but there wasn’t much need for it until the invention of the printing press due to the fact that censorship is mostly done to documents and websites. Over the last thousand years, censorship has been the subject of much debate and turmoil. Whether or not it morally right for a government to be able to censor things from the public’s

One example of this is an organization called Article 19. They believe very firmly that “Censorship in all its forms is often unjustifiable and is used simply to stop truths or ideas emerge which draw attention to powerful people or governments, or undermine ideology. This is inexcusable.” Although they are based in London, their article cites documents from free countries all around the world including America. All of these documents pertain to having the freedom of expression and not being criticized legally for what you do and/or say. The article also goes into much detail on whether or not governments should be allowed to censor something before it is published or made public and all of the problems that arise with this. For example, they bring up the point that if “the authorities are able to suppress publications which nobody has seen, it becomes impossible for others to verify whether the suppression was indeed justified; it is a question of time before such an unchecked power is abused to prevent criticism of government.” (Article

It does have a lot of strengths and credibility for it to be reliable, but it was biased toward the abolition of censorship. Some of the strengths it had were that it gave many reasons to back up their side and they were all supported by large amounts of evidence, it was written by a credible organization, and it was written by a team of people who were very knowledgeable on the topic of censorship and its rich history. Having these different people write the article makes it somewhat less biased because they all had different viewpoints, but they all had to come together to write one piece. For Article 19 being an organization based on the goal of trying to protect the freedom of expression for everyone all around the world this article was not nearly as biased as it could have been because they did acknowledge the counter claim and nod to the other side at some points. Overall, the strengths outweigh the one weakness and this is a reliable