It is the belief and desire of some that
there should be complete freedom of expression. We should not sit on the
fence, they say, either it is free or not free. Hence is the promotion of
freedom of expression.
Not so long ago, President Musharraf
supported the same ideology. Soon enough the language, dresses and moves of our
artists changed on the television screens. There was a hue and cry upon it by
the religio-oriented of the society. However, the seculars welcomed the change
with much applause.
Not long after, in a matter of five to six
years, the freedom of expression turned into a monster for its own champion,
Pervaiz Musharraf. This was the year 2007 and the free media was hailing
Pervaiz Musharraf for his tyranny. In a desperate attempt, Pervaiz Musharraf
imposed the Emergency of Nov 3, and banned the transmission of free media
channels.
People were forced to tune to the government
channel PTV for news update. There sat three to four people discussing morality
and how the idea of rein-free freedom was absurd and nowhere in the world did
freedom exist without some moral guidelines.
Pervaiz Musharraf was right this time in the
message he was sending out, only he had applied it topsy-turvy. The moral
guidelines are due where God has defined morality, i.e. in language, dresses,
moves, etc. However, the morality protection that he was seeking for himself,
would in fact not support him, for the morality defined for a tyrannical rule
is one and only, the straight forward truth, though in respectable words of course.
"The best of Jihad is to speak the true
word in front of a tyrannical ruler." [Hadith]
This was what the media had done, for which
it was punished.
'My best friend is one who tells me my bad
points.' [Quote of Caliph Umar RA]
And see how the women of Prophet Muhammed
SAW's times were liberated enough to speak their thoughts. Caliph Umar RA once
gave instructions to limit the amount of Haq Mahr given to brides by the
husbands to a certain amount and not beyond that. Upon this a woman stood up
and said 'O'Umar RA, Prophet Muhammed SAW set no limits for it, then why are
you limiting it?' And she quoted "...even if it be a heap of gold"
[Surah Al-Nisa, Verse 20].
Hence, Islam very much supports freedom of
expression, but neither rudeness nor vulgarity as part of it.
If this is backwardness in the eyes of some,
they should keep in mind that their idea of freedom of expression will
certainly turn around on them from whichever direction whatsoever, like it did
on Pervaiz Musharraf, who used to address the religio-oriented flippantly and
say 'If you do not like what you see, change the channel...'. Why could not he
do the same then when he came in the view of this freedom?
May Allah SWT guide him and forgive him, the
objective is not to demean Pervaiz Musharraf, but to give a visible example
from the recent past.
The thoughtless pursuit of boundary-free
freedom of expression by some may bring around those times very soon when we
hear children telling their parents 'To go to hell...' when they chide them and
draw nude pictures of their parents in art classes.
Why not? It is freedom of expression.
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