Freedom of Expression—A Double-Edged Right That Continues to Divide Peoples Across the Globe on How Best to Frame Its Scope and Limitations—An Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) Perspective in Times of Digitalization

Abstract

Freedom of speech is the foundation of democracy, which ensures the exercise of other human rights and freedoms by individuals and whole groups. Today, this right is recognized in many international acts at the universal and regional levels. Within the framework of this article, the author studies the specifics of the implementation of the right to freedom of opinion and their free expression in Islam. In Islam, suppression and repression are not acceptable. Accordingly, Islamic teachings uphold freedom of expression and recognize the role of critical thinking in empowering human beings as an honorable and responsible creation of God. The Quran upholds the right to freedom of religion and expression. It, however, teaches that one should express oneself through gentleness, courtesy, calmness, and respect. A multilayered approach to promoting freedom of expression while combating hate speech must start from deconstructing the narratives of hate speech and conducting a proper analysis to understand the processes that underpin the rise of hate speech in modern societies. At the core of hate speech construction and normalization is the intellectual legitimization of ethnic, religious, and national superiority, which justifies hatred, discrimination, and violence toward specific individuals and groups. Such legitimization is based on false narratives/ideas that tend to reduce a given ethnicity or religion to a devaluing identity based on nature/biology or cultures such as linking violence with Islam, cultural or biological inferiority for Blacks and Jews, and subsequently, their exclusion from and discrimination within a society. These constructed concepts are used by different far rights political parties and social movements’ platforms to build negative perceptions against targeted individuals and groups as well as to thwart and antagonize multicultural dynamics in their societies for political gains.KeywordsDigitalizationHuman rightsIslamUN human rights mechanismsRegional protection of human rights