As South Africa marks Media Freedom Day, it’s clear that its battle isn’t over. Attacks on journalists continue –through physical intimidation and there’s also the threat of new laws.
LGBTQ activists protest the Queermuseu’s closing.
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Marcia Tiburi, Universidade Federal do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (UNIRIO)
Artists, free speech advocates and gay rights activists in Brazil are dismayed after an LGBTQ-centric exhibit was closed because the subject matter offended evangelical Christians.
Kenyan authorities have arrested two WhatsApp group administrators for alleged hate speech.
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Kenya has published hate speech guidelines that target WhatsApp groups administrators, holding them responsible for offensive content.
Demonstrators gather in anticipation of controversial speaker Ann Coulter near the University of California, Berkeley campus, April 27, 2017.
AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez
New laws pending in Wisconsin and North Carolina would require public universities to punish students who disrupt campus speakers. But these laws would do more to hinder free speech than protect it.
Starving news media of revenue is a means of indirect state control.
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African governments have transitioned from outright control of freedom of expression to a subtler manipulation of the press that includes withholding state advertising from commercial media outlets.
Tshwane Executive Mayor Kgosientso Ramokgopa, surrounded by school pupils and officials, samples the metropole’s free internet service.
Pretoria News/Masi Losi
That South Africa has voted against rights enshrined in its globally celebrated, progressive constitution suggests a troubling indifference to its human rights commitments.
A protest in Cape Town against the SABC’s decision not to broadcast violent protests.
Mike Hutchings/Reuters
South Africa’s public broadcaster is in a state of crisis, gripped by paranoia and facing accusations of censorship. Can it be saved?
Workers arrange copies of the ‘Business Daily’, produced by Kenya’s Nation Media Group, the biggest newspaper publisher in East Africa.
Reuters/Thomas Mukoya
Namibia’s rise in the World Press Freedom rankings is stunning. The media environment in Africa, too, has improved. But media closures and the harassment of journalists are not yet things of the past.
Why do vigilante groups in Indonesia get away with harassing and threatening leftists?
Courtesy of Belok Kiri Festival
Non-state actors in Indonesia use violence and intimidation against a critical civil society as a means for the political and business elites to maintain wealth and power.
Does freedom of speech benefit any group of society more than another?
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The increasing use of social media in the financial sector has made it difficult for companies to exercise control, while at the same time allow employees freedom of expression in the workplace.
Students at Jawaharlal Nehru University protest the arrest of student leader Kanhaiya Kumar.
Rajat Gupta/EPA