What is censorship, really?
Let him who has not by Nadia Jelassi, showing sculptures of veiled women emerging from piles of stones that bring to mind a stoning, left her facing a five-year prison sentence in Tunisia.
Any conference worth its salt should, arguably, raise more questions than it answers. If so, then 'All that is banned is desired', the first world conference on censorship of artistic freedom of expression held last week in Oslo, Norway, certainly achieved its objectives. Two days of full-on sessions with artistic freedom of expression paladins from all over the world, had us yes condemning the atrocities being inflicted upon artists in more repressive regimes, but also questioning a number of cosy assumptions and convenient labels we sometimes like to make.
As the conference went on, I couldn't help question what, really - beyond the clichs and received definitions - is the meaning of censorship. Censorship is bad, there is no arguing with that. But where does censorship end, and curatorial independence start? Are we, sometimes, too hasty to stick the "I've been censored" label onto a rejection of an artistic project, conveniently brushing aside an assessment of quality inherent in the rejection?
For Marie Korpe, Executive Director of Freemuse - one of the conference's organising associations - "censorship is characterised by the contradictory fact that by imposing limits it produces reactions to those limits, by curtailing speech today censors set the conditions against which many more will speak tomorrow."
So let's get this out of the way - censorship is bad, both inherently and also because it invariably backfires on the censors. The Maltese theatre classification board attempted to block Unifaun's production of Stitching? Fast-forward a couple of years and the board itself has been disbanded, the entire stage censorship setup replaced with a liberal self-classification system.
Hearing artists talk about being imprisoned, tortured, threatened, humiliated, exiled, drives home both the horror of censorship and the courage of what these artists were ready to endure, in situations of hardcore artistic censorship. Burmese comedian and film director Zarganar spoke of having been buried to his neck in sand and threatened with being run over by a tank, of being forced to perform his comedy routines while hanging upside down in a jail cell. Filmmaker George Gittoes described how his actors in Peshawar and Jalalabad are routinely threatened and tortured because they work in the "immoral" industry of movies. Norwegian publisher William Nygaard was shot and left for dead outside his home in Oslo in 1993 for having published the Norwegian translation of Salman Rushdie's novel The Satanic Verses.
There is no possible justification for artistic censorship, not when it takes the above extreme physical forms, not when it's more nuanced and mutates - in more democratic countries - into talk of "appropriateness" and "community standards". Svetlana Mintcheva, Director of the US National Coalition Against Censorship, spoke of the risk that First Amendment protection is being extended into a right "not to be offended", hence justifying censorship of "offensive" expression.
I have always been fervently anti-censorship, in my publishing day job, through my involvement in a Ministry of Culture working group to propose legal amendments to end literary censorship, and through my work at the Malta Council for Culture and the Arts - MCCA's delegation to this conference being part of its incessant commitment against censorship and its efforts to remain up-to-date with international developments in the field.
And yet - and yet - as politically incorrect as it may sound to say so, looking beyond the undoubted cases of serious censorship and intimidation, I couldn't help stifle the nagging suspicion that a few of the "victims" were, at least in part, victims of lack of quality, that they had not been so much censored as told their work wasn't good enough or acceptable for a particular project. Which is where curatorial independence comes into play.
I am a firm believer in the imperativeness of curation in any artistic endeavour - the corollary of which being that a curator, to be effective, needs to have a wide discretion on what works to accept and what to cast aside. Accusations of censorship by the "rejected" artists are facile and ego-assuaging, and in the long term actually harm the cause against censorship. Of course no two cases are identical, and there will always be cases where censorship has come into play. But the point is that not all rejections are tantamount to censorship - and that thus defining censorship becomes urgent and relevant.
Read more here:
What is censorship, really?
- Stephen Colbert and I: The Tightening of Right-Wing Censorship - Informed Comment - July 20th, 2025 [July 20th, 2025]
- Artists speak out on attempted censorship of views on Gaza - Music Ally - July 20th, 2025 [July 20th, 2025]
- Raging Trump Desperately Tried to Censor Epstein Expos - Yahoo Home - July 20th, 2025 [July 20th, 2025]
- Steams Adult Games Under Threat in Financial Censorship Move That Cuts The Smut - Insider Gaming - July 20th, 2025 [July 20th, 2025]
- Turkey becomes the First to Censor Musks AI Chatbot Grok - Informed Comment - July 20th, 2025 [July 20th, 2025]
- Russia's new censorship push - Kremlin eyes control over WhatsApp and Telegram - RBC-Ukraine - July 20th, 2025 [July 20th, 2025]
- Revealed: The secret code words being used to beat online censorship - The Telegraph - July 18th, 2025 [July 18th, 2025]
- New Russian law criminalizes online searches for controversial content - The Washington Post - July 18th, 2025 [July 18th, 2025]
- Censoring All Men Are Created Equal cost U. Oregon $724K will other universities learn? - The College Fix - July 18th, 2025 [July 18th, 2025]
- Pixar Censorship Report Addressed By Director Of Studios Next Movie: The Movie Will Morph With Or Without You - Screen Rant - July 18th, 2025 [July 18th, 2025]
- Advertising Standards Authority Bans Viva!s Dairy is Scary Ad, Sparking Controversy Over Censorship - vegconomist - the vegan business magazine - July 18th, 2025 [July 18th, 2025]
- This VTuber Just Raised Over $780 for the ACLU. After Steam's New Content Policies? Her Anti-Censorship Message Is Urgent - VICE - July 18th, 2025 [July 18th, 2025]
- Desperate Royals Tried to Censor Leaked Kings Funeral Plans - The Daily Beast - July 18th, 2025 [July 18th, 2025]
- Ready or Not Shows Signs of Recovery After Censorship Controversy - Game Rant - July 18th, 2025 [July 18th, 2025]
- When Superman takes a side: Gaza, censorship, and the criminalisation of empathy in America - India Today - July 18th, 2025 [July 18th, 2025]
- Northeastern research breaches The Great Firewall to look at Chinese censorship - Northeastern Global News - July 16th, 2025 [July 16th, 2025]
- Ready Or Not Modder Retcons 'Censorship' Changes Within An Hour Of New Patch Going Live - IGN Southeast Asia - July 16th, 2025 [July 16th, 2025]
- Foreign journalists in the U.S. are self-censoring to protect themselves from the Trump administration - Poynter - July 16th, 2025 [July 16th, 2025]
- Turkey becomes the first to censor AI chatbot Grok - Global Voices - July 16th, 2025 [July 16th, 2025]
- How Iran and Israel control information - Index on Censorship - July 16th, 2025 [July 16th, 2025]
- "I've Been Dying To Play This Game For Years": With Ready Or Not Launching On Console Tomorrow, It Looks Like The Censorship Has Already... - July 16th, 2025 [July 16th, 2025]
- Spotify could pull out of Trkiye in row over censorship pressure - Music Ally - July 16th, 2025 [July 16th, 2025]
- Indian film board criticised for cutting overly sensual Superman kisses - The Guardian - July 16th, 2025 [July 16th, 2025]
- Superman's Big Kiss Was Cut By The Censors In India - Kotaku - July 16th, 2025 [July 16th, 2025]
- Russia and Belarus unveil censored 'patriotic AI' to rival the West - Ynetnews - July 14th, 2025 [July 14th, 2025]
- I Would Quit Before They Made Me Do That | Feedback - School Library Journal - July 14th, 2025 [July 14th, 2025]
- Reporter's Notebook - July 13th, 2025: An MCTS financial fiasco, Milwaukee arts winners and losers, book censorship in Wisconsin prisons - WTMJ - July 14th, 2025 [July 14th, 2025]
- Internet fumes at censorship of kissing scene in James Gunns Superman: They don't have a problem with Housefull 5 | Bollywood - Hindustan Times -... - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- Listen to the Trump-Referencing Clipse Track Universal Music Allegedly Tried to Censor - Mother Jones - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- The EUs Censorship Codes Are Coming for the First Amendment - National Review - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- Guest column | Book bans dont work. As a kid, I proved it. - The Washington Post - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- Ira Wells, who literally wrote the book on book bans, shares his thoughts on the politics of censorship - The Globe and Mail - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- Fans SLAM censorship of 33-second kissing scene in James Gunns Superman: 'They don't have a problem with - Times of India - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- After the Bombings, Iran Tightened Its Censorship. Iranians Arent Standing For It. - Council on Foreign Relations - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- All that glitters is not gold: A brief history of efforts to rebrand social media censorship - FIRE | Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- Zelensky, Zuckerberg, prolifers, a trans journalist, and a gay person with a Bible. How Russia is censoring the Axios/HBO documentary - Mediazona - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- Chinese censorship-busters claim Tencent is trying to kill its WeChat archive - theregister.com - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- Ethereum advances toward censorship-resistant scaling with zkEVM layer-1 shift - CryptoSlate - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- Peskov admitted to the existence of military censorship in Russia - - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- Trump Imposes 50% Tariff on Brazil: Political Tensions and Censorship at the Center - Cryptodnes.bg - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- :Director Honey Trehan on His Film Punjab 95 and the Censorship Battle with CBFC - Frontline Magazine - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- Ready Or Not Fans Hate The Game For All The Wrong Reasons - TheGamer - July 12th, 2025 [July 12th, 2025]
- China Censors Trump's Bomb Threat on Beijing - Newsweek - July 10th, 2025 [July 10th, 2025]
- Review | How censors tried and failed to keep LGBT voices out of the movies - The Washington Post - July 10th, 2025 [July 10th, 2025]
- UN AI summit accused of censoring criticism of Israel and big tech over Gaza war - Geneva Solutions - July 10th, 2025 [July 10th, 2025]
- From gr*pists to nip nops, how self-censorship shapes the language of TikTok : Code Switch - NPR - July 10th, 2025 [July 10th, 2025]
- Corrido Censorship: The paradox of funding and criminalizing cartel stories - The Oakland Post - July 10th, 2025 [July 10th, 2025]
- 'Ready or Not' Devs Unveil a Mod to Remove Censorship In-Game For a More Brutal Experience - player.one - July 10th, 2025 [July 10th, 2025]
- Centre flays X over 'censorship' claim, says platform delayed unblocking accounts - Times of India - July 10th, 2025 [July 10th, 2025]
- Turkey blocks Grok content, becoming first country to 'censor' the AI chatbot - Middle East Eye - July 10th, 2025 [July 10th, 2025]
- X blasts India censorship order on thousands of accounts - New Age BD - July 10th, 2025 [July 10th, 2025]
- 'JSK' Producer Suresh Kumar On Its Censorship: All Issues Began With 'L2: Empuraan' - The Hollywood Reporter India - July 8th, 2025 [July 8th, 2025]
- Some patriotic reflections on Independence Day - The Verge - July 8th, 2025 [July 8th, 2025]
- AI, Fair Use, and the Arsenal of Democracy - RealClearDefense - July 8th, 2025 [July 8th, 2025]
- Democratic nomination for Ithaca Common Council seat decided by just 11 votes - WSKG - July 8th, 2025 [July 8th, 2025]
- A Summer Reading List for Americas 250th Anniversary - Ash Center - July 8th, 2025 [July 8th, 2025]
- DEEP DIVE: $500 MILLION IN MEDIA FUNDING. BUT WHO'S CALLING THE SHOTS BEHIND THE HEADLINES? Its not just censorship its coordination. In Episode 2 of... - July 8th, 2025 [July 8th, 2025]
- Emergency: The Indian cartoonist who fought the censors with a smile - BBC - July 8th, 2025 [July 8th, 2025]
- Media in the Balkans: the rise of oligarchs - Osservatorio Balcani e Caucaso Transeuropa - July 8th, 2025 [July 8th, 2025]
- From Censorship to Fascism to Extermination: PW Talks with Will Potter - Publishers Weekly - July 8th, 2025 [July 8th, 2025]
- 'There is real fear': How Israel's attack on Iran enabled an assault on press freedoms - Middle East Eye - July 6th, 2025 [July 6th, 2025]
- Vilifying the Vylans or: How I learned to stop censoring and call for death to the BBC - Freedom News - - July 6th, 2025 [July 6th, 2025]
- Ready Or Not Studio Reveals What Exactly Has Been Censored And It's Not A Lot - TheGamer - July 6th, 2025 [July 6th, 2025]
- The EUs Internet Law, a Blueprint for Global CensorshipIncluding on American Platforms? - The Daily Signal - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- Blasphemy, Censorship, and the Future of Free Expression in Britain - Quillette - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- Ready or Not Dev Releases Before-and-After Screenshots as It Battles Against Censorship Backlash and Steam Review-Bomb Campaign - IGN - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- The humanities must have a role in overseeing AI censorship - Times Higher Education - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- YouTube, Trump Having Productive Discussions Over Censorship Case - The Information - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- 'Warned Not to Talk About It': Overseas Boys' Love Censorship Is Sending Young Women to Jail - Comic Book Resources - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- China is rushing to develop its AI-powered censorship system - Global Voices - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- Gov. McKee signs Freedom to Read Act into law - Rhode Island Current - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- 'Ill-conceived from the beginning': Judge ridicules Trump admin for 'slapdash' censorship of public health websites - Law and Crime News - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- How censorship affects the artistic expression in film - Times of India - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- What is The Ready or Not Censorship Controversy? Review Bombing Explained - Insider Gaming - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- Self-censorship and the spiral of silence - Insight News - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- Louisiana wants to censor citizen science, but residents are fighting back - News From The States - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- The many complex truths within the censoring of youth parliament - The Spinoff - July 4th, 2025 [July 4th, 2025]
- Free Speech Victory in Australia for Billboard Chris as X post censorship overturned - Alliance Defending Freedom International - July 2nd, 2025 [July 2nd, 2025]
- Read this: Pixar's self-censorship of Elio's queer themes may have doomed it - Yahoo - July 2nd, 2025 [July 2nd, 2025]
- China is rushing to develop its AI-powered censorship system - Global Voices Advox - July 2nd, 2025 [July 2nd, 2025]