Censorship Threatens Free Expression

I believe that censorship is the single greatest threat to free expression in the modern age. According to the Cambridge Dictionary, the definition of censorship is “the action of preventing part or the whole of a book, film, work of art, document, or other kind of communication from being seen or made available to the public, because it is considered to be offensive or harmful, or because it contains information that someone wishes to keep secret, often for political reasons.” Throughout American history there have been many occurrences of censorship directly oppressing free expression and attempting to stifle public voices. These mediums include, but are not limited to, music, films, television shows, online videos, comedy acts, public entertainment, and many forms of literature.

One of the first highly documented cases regarding the censorship of artistic content with claims of obscenity was in regard to the 1922 James Joyce novel Ulysses. Prior to the novel’s US publication, the work was serialized in the literary magazine The Little Review. Following this first publication of Ulysses, three issues of The Little Review were seized and burned by the US Postal Service on the grounds that its content was deemed “obscene.” A complaint was made regarding a particular chapter that was published in the magazine, and after a trial the publishers were convicted and fined.
When ruling for the 1933 case, Judge John M. Woolsey established that “the important notion that an entire work, rather than just a portion of it, should be considered for the work to be declared obscene.”

These obscenity laws would further transform in the next following decades. In addition to the censorship of controversial reading materials, public entertainers would face similar challenges that directly impacted their freedom of speech. Two comedians that were arrested for performing their acts in public are Lenny Bruce and George Carlin.
On October 4th, 1961, Lenny Bruce was arrested for obscenity; his act at the Jazz Workshop in San Francisco had used foul language and was laced in egregious sexual undertones. Although the jury ultimately acquitted Lenny Bruce of the charges, other law enforcement organizations began monitoring his acts throughout the nation. As a result of these monitoring efforts, Lenny Bruce was arrested several times for charges stemming from obscenity.
George Carlin’s arrest occurred a decade later on July 21st, 1972, following his performance of his routine “The Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television” at the Milwaukee Summerfest event. The charges were subsequently dismissed a few months later in December of the same year.

One television show that is no stranger to controversies or censorship of its content is the Emmy Award winning animated sitcom, South Park. Ironically, there was one South Park two-parter episode that courted enough controversy that the network took extreme steps to actually censor the episodes’ content. Comedy Central then pulled the two episodes from regular rotation all together. In further attempts at censorship, a speech that Kyle gave about censorship was, ironically, censored, including on the home DVD release of season 14. The speech was leaked online years later.

Censorship is also perpetrated by a number of social media platforms. YouTube is notorious for its reputation in limiting free expression among creators that release videos on the video sharing website. The censorship has only increased with companies more sensitive to the type of content that they tie their advertising to on digital platforms. Demonetization of videos is a primary way content is censored on YouTube. This loss of income for many creators has a direct impact on how content is generated and featured on the video platform.

Another form of censorship that is becoming more and more common in the present digital age is self-censorship. Self-censorship is when someone, most often a journalist or media outlet, censors their own speech or expression. They choose not to say something — perhaps not to report a story on the government or give an opinion on a new law — that could be important for the public, either because of its factual nature or because it would contribute to a robust public debate on the issue. Self-censorship is considered to be a voluntary act, but it is often done out of fear or pressure. The act of self-censorship is particularly troubling; when free voices silence themselves for fear of retribution, it poses the question of how free are we really in a thriving individualistic society?