Shashidhar Nanjundaiah | Hashtag power: Twitter, govt in fight for survival
Published : Feb 23, 2021, 4:48 am IST
Updated : Feb 23, 2021, 4:48 am IST
The social media has two broad roles — the organisational and the dialogic, and it is the former that is spooking nervous governments
By threatening Twitter officials with jail and publicly contemplating the application of media laws to the social media, the government is putting on public display how spooked, rather than concerned, it is. (Photo: AFP)
An Editors Guild of India webinar on February 12 on reporting from the Naxalite badlands featured song videos, pornography and abusive language. Now, why would an organised group of “unknown persons” like to cyber-bomb a seminar? Perhaps the theme was inconvenient? As the guild pointed out later, the seminar would talk about the excesses of the government and the struggles of the tribals — or Adivasis — at the hands of the left-wing extremists. Open webinars are vulnerable to mischief anyway, and this writer has himself faced tough, disruptive questions during them. But such is the nature of free speech. Where does free speech end? Would we consider the disruption of the guild’s webinar also free speech, or would we find it unreasonable enough to be restricted? Should the guild be held responsible for those who misused the platform?