You must have come across many news debates on news channels or must have read about many rants on the social media like Facebook, twitter and also on the YouTube about the Nationalism and Freedom of Speech. So what is this Freedom of Speech? And why is it so much related to the nationalism and patriotism about our country? Slow down a bit. We have written this essay on Freedom of Speech to satisfy all your questions, how it is related to nationalism, the origin, and history, why do we need it, limits of it and other related topics. This essay will definitely help you for essay and speech competition. As this topic is currently present in the current affairs of the country, students may also be asked to write a paragraph on freedom of speech in their exams and even for their homework. We have kept the language of this essay easy to understand yet good enough to give you the insights of the topic. So, let’s start.
Essay on Freedom Speech and Expression
Do you realize everything you post on social media is seen by thousands of people? People like your friends, acquaintances, family members and even the people you don’t know show their opinion on your post and that is how the social media sites are designed. You make an opinion about something and you’ll find many people who will disagree with your opinion. So they just go and show you why your opinion is wrong according to them by putting some sensible arguments or some just curse you because you disagreed with their opinion with no logic at all. Is this a good thing to do? Human beings are created in such a way that they can see, think, analyze and make a decision about everything. Different people can analyze the same thing from the different point of views. It is not necessary to agree with something because everyone else is agreeing or supporting it. And this is where the freedom of speech comes into the picture.
So, what is the freedom? Putting into simple words, freedom is where you can think, believe, act, speak, live, gather, worship whatever, wherever and whenever you want. Yes! You can speak whatever you want until unless you are hurting someone deliberately. Freedom of speech and expression is the first and most important condition is the liberty. Freedom of speech and expression is the right to express your thoughts and opinions by words of mouth, writing, printing, pictures or any other way. Yes, any citizen of the country has a constitutional right to freedom of speech. This right to freedom of expression is not only protected by the Constitution of the country but also by other international bodies which are working in the favor of human rights.
The right of speech has been always hindered by the rulers from the ancient times too. In the ancient society, people were not allowed to speak against the king, government and the God. The people who used to raise their voice and make an opinion about the king or the God were used to face severe punishment and even the death. In ancient Greece, the Greek philosopher Socrates was executed because he was accused of talking about the Gods and influencing the youth of Greece negatively. Galileo, who in his research found that earth is not at the center of universe and sun doesn’t revolve around it but earth does, he went through a lof persecution for expression his reseach because it against belife of the church. In the pre-independence era of India, people were not allowed to talk about the British empire, gather for a cause and saying, “Inquilab Zindabad” which means “Long live the revolution.” People were punished harshly for raising their voices against the government.
After the independence of India, there was a strong necessity to make a law to protect people from expressing their ideas, beliefs, and opinions without the fear of punishment and that is how the right to freedom of speech and expression took birth in India. There is a little to no difference between freedom of speech and freedom of expression. Speech is the form of expression. But not everyone expresses their ideas and opinion only through speech. Freedom of expression is a broader sense of freedom to express your thoughts and opinions in many ways like writing, printing, pictures etc whereas as the freedom of speech focuses on the right to speak specifically.
As liberty of speech gives you the power and right to express your thoughts and opinion to the world, it has some limits too. You cannot say whatever you want about anyone or anything. You cannot compromise the security of the state and friendly relations with the foreign states. This means a person who is responsible for protecting and classifying information cannot disclose it under the freedom of speech as it might hamper the security of the state. Also, a government official cannot use it to talk about the relationship with the foreign states. You can not take advantage of it to damage the public order. It means freedom of speech doesn’t allow you to shout “there is a bomb!” in crowded places like theatres, malls etc. You cannot accuse the court and talk anything wrong about the court, it will be the contempt of court. Defamation of someone is not allowed, decency and morality cannot be compromised under the freedom of speech. Incitement to an offense which means you are not supposed to provoke people to do unlawful behavior by your speech or expressions. You cannot defame the jurisdiction and integrity of India by your speech and expression.
The why do we need the freedom of speech and expression? Expressing one’s ideas and opinions without the fear of punishment is not the only purpose of freedom of speech. We need it because discussing the issues openly with people can bring out the best solutions to the problem. It is the way of self-fulfillment and self-development. If we are free to decide what we can speak, hear or read, then it will definitely help in our intellectual growth. A democracy works because of the people and if people are not allowed to say what they want then people won’t participate in the democracy and the democracy will not grow, hence to the smooth and stable working of the democracy the freedom of speech is needed.
As more of anything can create problems too and freedom of speech and expression is no exception to that. Today this freedom is used for wrong purposes, it is misused to hurt the sentiments of people from specific groups, spreading hatred, hurting the beliefs of people, spreading wrong information, influencing people in a negative way, all under the name of exercising their right to freedom of speech.
Freedom of speech is the most precious liberty for the people. It gives us the power to speak, read, believe, think, worship, act whatever and however we want. But with great power comes the great responsibility. (Yes, this line is from Spiderman movie.). We need to cherish this freedom and not to abuse for sake of politics, malpractices and ill intentions. A lot of people from dictatorial regimes don’t get a chance to say anything. We are fortunate to have it, we should respect it and keep using it to strengthen the democracy and also question its stakeholders.
These Secret Tips to win the Speech competition are only for winners!
Here in this article, have given this information in essay format, but with little modifications, you can easily write a great speech from it. And if you summarise the overall topic that will give a good content for paragraph writing.
I hope this essay gives you enough knowledge about freedom of speech and expression. If you liked this article then please let me know in the comment section below to motivate me to write more and help people more. Thank you. 🙂