It is racist to say free speech is Eurocentric.
In all of my courses that touch on freedom of expression, I have asked my students to discuss this question in my first class: “The President of a Canadian university said freedom of expression is ‘Eurocentric’ and leads to the suppression of minority groups. As such, it needs to be remade in the era of globalization. Do you agree? To what extent do you agree? If you don’t, why not?” This usually comes after my explanation of the “natural law tradition,” according to which there are universal, fundamental principles governing people in all societies and cultures who enjoy fundamental, innate natural rights based on these principles. Examples of fundamental rights are the rights to freedom of expression, life, and property.
As expected, students in general appreciate the natural law tradition and even expressly embrace it. However, some students agreed that freedom of expression can be said to be “Eurocentric.” Numerous said “no, the idea itself is not Eurocentric”: people in different cultures still enjoy free speech but their governments impose their own limits on it and their understanding of the concept is therefore different. Given their approval of the natural law tradition, their answers do seem to be logically inconsistent.
Given that almost all of my students are from Western democracies, their answers demonstrating their toleration of different cultural standards are foreseeable and understandable. To some extent, given their educational backgrounds, they were eager to show their tolerance. To tolerate is good; intolerance breeds disasters. This is what most of them have been taught. In addition, the statement was given by an authority figure and students might not have felt comfortable to disagree strongly with those in power. I did not intend it to be a “trap question”: my question was asked in a neutral tone, and the statement was indeed spoken by the President of a Canadian university. My sole intent has always been to educate.
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Hearing their answers, I told them to rethink what the natural law tradition is. I then told them that freedom of expression is not Eurocentric. Not all people were born in or are living in democratic countries and so do not enjoy this fundamental freedom. If this freedom is fundamental and innate, the unfortunate fact that they do not enjoy it does not mean that they are not entitled to this freedom, however.
Then some very engaged students replied, “Yes I agree that it is not Eurocentric in the sense that people in less democratic countries are still entitled to enjoy it. However, their ideas of free speech might be/are likely different from our idea of it.” It shows that same well-intended tolerance embraced by Western-educated elites and their appreciation for diverse cultures.
I asked them, “Are you sure their idea of free speech is really different? Of the three purposes of free speech, which do you think they care less? Pursuit of truth/knowledge, democratic governance, or individual development?” Well, some dared to say “individual development” because some societies and people care less about the individual. Others dared to say “democratic governance.”Â
Wow. I do not doubt that some individuals lack individuality and do not care about their autonomy. I do not doubt that some individuals scoff at the idea of democracy. But their statements revealed something deeply troubling in their educational system, which instilled in them the idea that individual development and democracy are not inherently important to some groups of people.
Some societies are known to be more collectivistic than others, but individuals still reign. Throughout history, there have existed poets in all societies, who express their sentiments and not merely the collective thoughts of their society and are by no means propaganda machines of their governments. Countless peoples in all societies have been imprisoned for harboring thoughts and opinions contrary to the authorities’. If people can freely choose, and won’t get punished for their choices, would they prefer democracy to autocracy/dictatorship?
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I moved on to say that however good the intention of the President of the Canadian university might be, his statement has racist implications. It implies that people in non-western cultures are not entitled to the same amount of freedom of speech because of where they come from. How can this statement be un-racist?
This statement is not only racist but utterly condescending. Following his statement, should we tell courageous people who are in jail that they deserve to be there because they fought for something that they are not entitled to and they exercised a freedom that they did not in fact possess and deserve? Would you say that to Liu Xiaobo, for instance, who won the Nobel Prize for Peace while in jail?
The freedom to own our bodies is also an innate, fundamental right. This freedom entails the freedom from rape and other sexual assaults. If you see a woman being raped, would you step in and save her? Or would you find out her race before deciding whether to offer help? Would anyone think saving an Asian woman from being raped by an Asian man is an act of white colonialism? If so, should the Asian woman not seek help, try to persuade that rape isn’t rape, and perhaps fake orgasm? Thinking in these terms would be purely mental gymnastics and only certain ideologically possessed individuals could succeed engaging in such gymnastics.
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Cultural relativism must not be taken too far. Should we allow polygamy in Western democracies in the name of tolerance and diversity, because some immigrants came from countries where it is legal? Should we even allow the enforcement of Sharia laws and legalize honor killing here to show how diverse and tolerant we are? Should we sink that low?
I would not blame the students for their inconsistent beliefs, as experienced academics who should know better are equally mistaken with regard to the same issue. I mentioned elsewhere in this blog that my book proposal was almost rejected because one reviewer for Cambridge University Press considered my approach “flawed” in its application of the natural law tradition to an Asian jurisdiction (Hong Kong). These people should have known better.
Although the publication of my book signaled the triumph of common sense and justice over such dangerous relativism and the people who pushed this flawed idea to its extreme. Yet the fact that my book was almost rejected still bothered me from time to time. The more I think of it I more I pity people with years of studies who are so flawed and logically inconsistent in their thinking and who are seemingly unware of their own racism.
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Although I have always intended to educate my students, I have never ruled out the possibility that some might feel troubled by my answers and drop the course. I do not punish people for harboring different opinions, provided that they make conscientious efforts to support their arguments. However, it is still important to make them aware of the implicit racism in statements like this. If they feel upset enough to drop out, it need not be a bad thing.