“We face threats to freedom of expression if we are unable or unwilling to rise to the challenge of freedom of expression, when that freedom is exercised. We are all of us—especially those who gather at a book fair—quick to announce to the world that we’re champions of freedom of expression. But when we regard someone’s expression as offensive, why do we seek to silence them? Why is it not enough simply to condemn what they say as offensive and leave untouched their right to say it?”

"Ashok Kumar Sarkar Memorial Lecture 2015" Jan 29, 2015 http://ziahaiderrahman.com/aks/. Retrieved on 2015-02-12.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "We face threats to freedom of expression if we are unable or unwilling to rise to the challenge of freedom of expressio…" by Zia Haider Rahman?
Zia Haider Rahman photo
Zia Haider Rahman 13
British novelist

Related quotes

Franklin D. Roosevelt photo

“In the future days which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms.
The first is freedom of speech and expression”

Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945) 32nd President of the United States

1940s, State of the Union Address — The Four Freedoms (1941)
Context: In the future days which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms.
The first is freedom of speech and expression — everywhere in the world.
The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way — everywhere in the world.
The third is freedom from want, which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants — everywhere in the world.
The fourth is freedom from fear, which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor — anywhere in the world.
That is no vision of a distant millennium. It is a definite basis for a kind of world attainable in our own time and generation.

Marc Randazza photo
Dinesh D'Souza photo

“Somehow freedom for religious expression has become freedom from religious expression.”

Dinesh D'Souza (1961) Indian-American political commentator, filmmaker, author

Source: Books, What's So Great about Christianity (2007), Ch. 3
Source: What's So Great About Christianity
Context: Today courts wrongly interpret separation of church and state to mean that religion has no place in the public arena, or that morality derived from religion should not be permitted to shape our laws. Somehow freedom for religious expression has become freedom from religious expression. Secularists want to empty the public square of religion and religious-based morality so they can monopolize the shared space of society with their own views.

Salman Rushdie photo

“What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.”

Salman Rushdie (1947) British Indian novelist and essayist

As quoted in "The right to be downright offensive" by Jonathan Duffy in BBC News Magazine (21 December 2004) http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/4114497.stm

Angelo Vulpini photo

“Freedom does not exist partially, if I don't have the freedom of opinion or expression regarding whoever, then there's certainly no actual freedom”

Angelo Vulpini (2003) Venezuelan recording artist

Source: Posted on @angelovulpini, Instagram (June 3, 2019)

Noam Cohen photo

“Unlike in the United States, where freedom of expression is a fundamental right that supersedes other interests, Europe views an individual’s privacy and freedom of expression as almost equal rights.”

Noam Cohen (1999) American journalist

[Noam, Cohen, The New York Times, Times Articles Removed From Google Results in Europe, October 3, 2014, http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/04/business/media/times-articles-removed-from-google-results-in-europe.html, October 29, 2014]

Rockwell Kent photo
Matt Ridley photo
Max Brooks photo

Related topics