DEMAREE J.B. RAVAL
Disguised censorship
Sunday, 03 08, 2009
The critical provision in the Right of Reply Bill (RORB) reads: “All persons who are accused directly or indirectly of any offense or are criticized by innuendo, suggestion or rumor for any lapse in behaviour in public or private shall have the right to reply to the charge published in newspapers and other publications or to criticisms aired over radio, television, website or through any electronic device.”
Right off, the absurdities spawned by this provision will be legion. Let us take the case of The Daily Tribune, and apply to it this ludicrous provision of the RoRB.
On any given day, this paper over its twelve pages minces no words - either by innuendo, suggestion, or outright accusation - in criticizing individuals and organizations for their indiscretions, corrupt acts, omissions, and lapses in behavior. With the enactment of the RoRB into law, could we still expect The Daily Tribune to retain on a daily basis its complexion as a fearless vehicle to lay bare the despicable acts or omissions of those deserving to be accused? What will happen would be, on alternate days, because the replies of those this paper and its writers have accused, criticized or denounced would have to be accommodated and given free space, The Daily Tribune would be fearless one day and generous the next. Unafraid and ballsy one day, and indulgent and obsequious the next. The public will be confused. Absurd and ludicrous, is it not?
This paper is a favorite venue for paid announcements critical of the administration. With the enactment of the RoRB into law, do we expect the administration to buy equal space for its reply to the critical announcement? Or expect it to demand equal space, for free this time because, after all, it has a legislated right to enforce? Either way - whether it pays or gets space for free - just imagine how confused the readers would be. The editors and the publisher of this paper will just have to grin and bear it, and accept that their editorial independence and discretion have been spiked and thrown to the dustbin.
This is disguised censorship, if you ask me. The Daily Tribune would no longer have the independence to report that crime, that dishonesty, that immoral or dishonourable conduct committed with impunity. There will no longer be consistency in its advocacy, as it must now allocate space to accommodate the replies - no matter how evasive, inexplicit, shifty and dilatory they are - which its editors and publisher cannot even edit. There will eventually be a restriction in its circulation, either in reduced number of printed copies, or simply that the copies available are no longer read, because the public will stop buying a fearless/generous, ballsy/obsequious paper.
Censorship takes many forms. One of them is undermining the financial independence of media. Imagine a newspaper like The Daily Tribune losing its readers who regularly buy the newspaper, who must now abstain from buying it on the expected day of the reply to the accusatory article (because they simply do not care to know the reply) or who will simply be turned off by the inconsistent handling of issues and articles. Then again, who would care putting in their advertisements in a newspaper that has lost its readership? On the day that RoRB is enacted into law, the independence of this paper shall have been compromised because of this disguised censorship.
Persons, whether private or public, and their acts and utterances, are legitimate subjects of comment or reporting when the interests of society require that their acts and utterances be subject to public awareness and discussion. To this extent, the rights of an individual about whom accusatory statements have been made are subordinated to the interests of the community. This is the object of the Freedom of Expression. The RoRB curtails that freedom. Once enacted into law, it would assume the role of arbiter of what must see print in this paper, its content and slant, and when. That is plain and simple censorship.
A final point. With the enactment of the RoRB into law, do we expect the replies to take the place of libel suits and recourse to damages? Presently, the person subject of a defamatory article can demand as a matter of right equal space to clear his name. That is without prejudice to his right to file a libel suit, with damages. With the RoRB under the proposed availment of only one remedy to the exclusion of the others, the other rights of the defamed are being legislated out. Hmmm, will His Immensity agree?
What to do then? Kill the RoRB now. The vigilance exhibited in exposing the evils of the RoRB must be vigorously replicated in getting the bill to be withdrawn by its authors, no matter in what stage it is now in the legislative mill. The vacuous promise of a veto by Malacanang should not lull media into complacency. We have heard so many promises before, the most galling one made in December 2002, using no less than our national hero as guarantor. After all, the RoRB once enacted into law could be a refuge of the administration to absolve itself of the misery, the corruption, and the thefts it has foisted on the nation.
000 --- 000
Erratum: The fifth paragraph of last Sunday’s article should have read as follows: “The accuser of Macasaet, et al. had included them as participants in an alleged break-in into the offices of Philcomsat Holdings Corporation (PHC), where vital documents, proving the multi-million plunder of PHC by a band of robbers labelled in a privilege speech by Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile as ‘Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves,’ were ‘liberated.’ ”
For comments about this website:Webmaster@tribune.net.ph
Right off, the absurdities spawned by this provision will be legion. Let us take the case of The Daily Tribune, and apply to it this ludicrous provision of the RoRB.
On any given day, this paper over its twelve pages minces no words - either by innuendo, suggestion, or outright accusation - in criticizing individuals and organizations for their indiscretions, corrupt acts, omissions, and lapses in behavior. With the enactment of the RoRB into law, could we still expect The Daily Tribune to retain on a daily basis its complexion as a fearless vehicle to lay bare the despicable acts or omissions of those deserving to be accused? What will happen would be, on alternate days, because the replies of those this paper and its writers have accused, criticized or denounced would have to be accommodated and given free space, The Daily Tribune would be fearless one day and generous the next. Unafraid and ballsy one day, and indulgent and obsequious the next. The public will be confused. Absurd and ludicrous, is it not?
This paper is a favorite venue for paid announcements critical of the administration. With the enactment of the RoRB into law, do we expect the administration to buy equal space for its reply to the critical announcement? Or expect it to demand equal space, for free this time because, after all, it has a legislated right to enforce? Either way - whether it pays or gets space for free - just imagine how confused the readers would be. The editors and the publisher of this paper will just have to grin and bear it, and accept that their editorial independence and discretion have been spiked and thrown to the dustbin.
This is disguised censorship, if you ask me. The Daily Tribune would no longer have the independence to report that crime, that dishonesty, that immoral or dishonourable conduct committed with impunity. There will no longer be consistency in its advocacy, as it must now allocate space to accommodate the replies - no matter how evasive, inexplicit, shifty and dilatory they are - which its editors and publisher cannot even edit. There will eventually be a restriction in its circulation, either in reduced number of printed copies, or simply that the copies available are no longer read, because the public will stop buying a fearless/generous, ballsy/obsequious paper.
Censorship takes many forms. One of them is undermining the financial independence of media. Imagine a newspaper like The Daily Tribune losing its readers who regularly buy the newspaper, who must now abstain from buying it on the expected day of the reply to the accusatory article (because they simply do not care to know the reply) or who will simply be turned off by the inconsistent handling of issues and articles. Then again, who would care putting in their advertisements in a newspaper that has lost its readership? On the day that RoRB is enacted into law, the independence of this paper shall have been compromised because of this disguised censorship.
Persons, whether private or public, and their acts and utterances, are legitimate subjects of comment or reporting when the interests of society require that their acts and utterances be subject to public awareness and discussion. To this extent, the rights of an individual about whom accusatory statements have been made are subordinated to the interests of the community. This is the object of the Freedom of Expression. The RoRB curtails that freedom. Once enacted into law, it would assume the role of arbiter of what must see print in this paper, its content and slant, and when. That is plain and simple censorship.
A final point. With the enactment of the RoRB into law, do we expect the replies to take the place of libel suits and recourse to damages? Presently, the person subject of a defamatory article can demand as a matter of right equal space to clear his name. That is without prejudice to his right to file a libel suit, with damages. With the RoRB under the proposed availment of only one remedy to the exclusion of the others, the other rights of the defamed are being legislated out. Hmmm, will His Immensity agree?
What to do then? Kill the RoRB now. The vigilance exhibited in exposing the evils of the RoRB must be vigorously replicated in getting the bill to be withdrawn by its authors, no matter in what stage it is now in the legislative mill. The vacuous promise of a veto by Malacanang should not lull media into complacency. We have heard so many promises before, the most galling one made in December 2002, using no less than our national hero as guarantor. After all, the RoRB once enacted into law could be a refuge of the administration to absolve itself of the misery, the corruption, and the thefts it has foisted on the nation.
000 --- 000
Erratum: The fifth paragraph of last Sunday’s article should have read as follows: “The accuser of Macasaet, et al. had included them as participants in an alleged break-in into the offices of Philcomsat Holdings Corporation (PHC), where vital documents, proving the multi-million plunder of PHC by a band of robbers labelled in a privilege speech by Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile as ‘Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves,’ were ‘liberated.’ ”
For comments about this website:Webmaster@tribune.net.ph
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