Never Again International

Never Again International
22 November 2006

A Poorly Written Internal Dialogue About Freedom of Speech and its Implications in Peacebuilding

Though the power has gone out again, we do have a couple of things going for us at the Peacebuilding Centre (PbC): the gang of gigantor-grasshoppers that have somehow found their way inside to flutter their helicopter wings at the tip of our hair, the small tin with a scented candle burning its breath on us and, well, 5 hours of battery power on this computer.

Something keeps coming up this week, if not in reality, than at least in my mind (which, you may come to notice, is often far from reality): This question of free speech and free expression. One of the things that Never Again promotes is critical thinking. Is this possible in a society that knowingly, practically willingly, says that free speech is not only bad but also counter-intuitive? Rwanda is by far not “out of the woods,” but there has been a lot done to encourage the role of youth in preventing another atrocity (oh, you know like that of mass ethnic cleansing) from occurring. In fact, that is what we/I am doing here, right? This whole idea of “peacebuilding” begins with the youth. But in order to promote peace, it seems that voices are somewhat subjugated.

This came up the other day, as I was observing a discussion about a proposal that someone had submitted to Never Again Rwanda (NAR). I am not sure what the proposal was really about, but part of the background in the piece mentioned that some RPF members had murdered innocent Hutu’s as the civil war was coming to an end (it was considered over when the RPF ended the genocide in July 1994). It was mentioned that by putting this in writing, the proposal writer was basically denying the genocide (which I don’t think was at all implied) by saying Tutsi’s had killed Hutu’s. It was said this kind of stuff cannot be written and that it can be punishable.

At the same time, we say “Never Again,” we say “oh, everyone must have rights, everyone must be equal as we are all the same.” All right, so this is a highly contextualized situation in Rwanda, magnified in so many people’s minds for what happened in 1994. But when terms like “genocidal ideology” and “manipulation” and “divisionism” can be tossed around every time opposition is brought to an idea, isn’t that actually a complete contradiction in terms? So maybe you are having trouble connecting this to my initial reaction to free speech, free expression, and critical thinking (I sure am, so if you aren’t maybe you know something about me that I don’t, so let me know). Maybe I should try to de-contextualize for a moment.

To completely take this conversation in another direction, think about the reaction to the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) when they protect the neo-Nazis, KKK, or Skinheads in their right to hold a rally in some polarized neighbourhood somewhere in America. As much as one may speak hatred, and as much as I would be one of the first people out there acting against the hate speech, they are allowed to use their first amendment rights. While I hate (hmm, such a strong word—reminds me of a lot of real negative stuff) that such a rally can take place, I accept it and maybe I get 10,000 of my closest friends and get a marching permit across the street (or maybe I anonymously tip the cops about the anarchists in black—think WTO, Seattle, Starbucks and windows—hanging out in the middle of the crowd of white-supremacists and wait for the billy-clubs to shine).

Okay, so maybe that is a frivolous example, as Americans are not cumulatively dealing with PTSD. Heck, we are much more clever in hiding our genocides. We only celebrate them at holidays (Thanksgiving, Columbus Day) and protract them over centuries so no one has to notice anymore (unless you are, oh I don’t know, Native American or African American), turning our institutions and systems—schools, the “justice” system, health care—into metaphoric, but very real, killing fields. Americans, and other “Westerners,” supposedly live in peaceful societies. Even though we are still engaged in conflict internally and externally. We deny needing to do such things as “peacebuilding” as we are not in acute conflict (tell that to someone still displaced in Mississippi or Louisiana). We sit in international “development” institutes focused on “peacebuilding” elsewhere (us vs. them) and barely take part in it ourselves. We can have hate speech because we are a “free” society and we are also “peace-loving” therefore we know how to deal with opposition. Bullshit.

Have I made an argument yet? Probably not. I think what I may be trying to question, is: must free speech and free expression be curbed in order to build a peaceful society? It almost needs another step back in order to ask our selves “what is a peaceful society?” Is it one without conflict, whereby there may not be any opposition? Is it one where there is equal distribution of resources—materially and monetarily? What exactly are we building toward if really what needs to be eliminated is poverty, hunger and malaria (okay, you can add HIV/AIDS, guns, rich corporations needing to exploit raw materials and women and girls that have to walk miles each day to achieve water or wood for their families) in order for even the possibility for “peace” to exist?

How can we claim to promote critical thinking in our youth, if we cannot promote freedom of speech in society? I find something very hypocritical in that. I am not sure if I am willing to pass this one off as “oh, they experienced genocide, it is okay to curb some rights to avoid from happening again.” Is not the silencing of oppositional forces one of the first signs of society in turmoil? I am not talking about the need to allow anyone to say anything about everything. Silencing turns into a real constructive way for the voiceless to become angry and rise-up. We have seen this in many manifestations in the last 50 years: Watts in 1965, Everywhere in Europe in 1968, Soweto in 1976, Tiananmen in 1989, my mothers kitchen in 1991, L.A. in 1992, Paris and Ethiopia in 2005, and the various many I left out.

“Peacebuilding” is a great word, and it could have a great meaning. It takes words with negative connotations like turmoil, conflict and hate, and attempts to throw them into a receptacle (or burn them in a metal tin in the yard of the Peacebuilding Centre). But, there is so much just under the surface of “peacebuilding” in Rwanda. How do we, whether we are outsiders or Rwandans, decipher and pragmatically approach “peacebuilding” in this context? There is so much to be said about language and speech. How long can “genocidal ideologies” be used before people realize it is code for “shut up or watch out!”? And, with a whimper, freedom of expression and speech is gone.

As I am obviously full of questions and very empty of answers, maybe I will leave you with all I have just said as the power is back on and the gigantor-grasshoppers are sleeping. This means I can cozy up for a book about genocide underneath my mosquito-proof canopy that allows me to believe I am living in an antiquity-era English castle.