Jorge Luis Borges thought censorship did have a positive side because, despite being very bad on principle, it obliged writers to express themselves in more subtle ways than they would if they did not have to worry about what people in power would think about them. Before he was murdered by the thuggish Soviet regime, Osip Mandelstam used to say he was pleased that the Communist authorities took poetry so terribly seriously that they were more than willing to persecute practitioners who preferred unproletarian genres such as symbolism to the officially approved socialist realism.
Until fairly recently, those living in Western democracies had no need to take comfort in such arcane considerations because, within limits which most regarded as reasonable, they were free to write or say pretty well what they liked, but there are signs that a period that was characterised by an unusual degree of tolerance is fast coming to an end. Technological progress is providing the powerful with tools that help them control what goes on in the minds of the rest of the population. In Europe, especially the United Kingdom, people are getting clapped in jail for saying nasty things on the “social media” and even expressing a mild criticism of something that happens to be fashionable in elite circles can get you into trouble with the cops who will put a “non-crime incident” on your record that could cause you much grief.
Meanwhile, in the United States, Donald Trump’s government has ordered public servants to explore remote regions of cyberspace in search of dangerous thoughts so foreign students who have been guilty of expressing anti-American or pro-terrorist views can be denied entry to US universities even if they committed their mental crimes before emerging from adolescence.
Is censorship returning to Argentina? There are ominous signs that, once again, it is knocking at the door. According to a much respected journalist, La Nación’s Hugo Alconada Mon, Javier Milei’s government wants the country’s well-funded intelligence agencies to keep a close eye on the miscreants who “manipulate public opinion” and are wicked enough to cast doubts on the efficacy and wisdom of its economic programme by, among other things, undermining trust in officialdom. Are they plotting to overthrow the government? It seems there are people in high places who think there are subversives and that they deserve to be treated accordingly.
To justify what they are up to, those behind it allude to the danger they see posed by unscrupulous foreign regimes that spread “disinformation” in an attempt to affect elections in those parts of the world in which they still mean something. This has been a hot issue for at least a decade. It may be nonsensical to think that it was thanks entirely to some incredibly clever Russian cyberwarriors that Trump beat Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential elections and Kamala Harris a year ago, but it would appear that some North Americans and their friends elsewhere genuinely believe that this was the case. In any event, fears that the dissemination of “fake news” by malignant actors in Moscow, Beijing and other such places can have dire political consequences in democratic countries have provided would-be censors everywhere with plenty of plausible excuses. They are making the most of them.
Like previous generations of Argentine “liberals,” Milei and those surrounding him want to unshackle the economy but are rather less keen on letting their critics speak their minds. So far, the President and his propagandists have limited themselves to insulting those they regard as dissidents, bombarding them with an imaginative variety of opprobrious epithets, but it would seem they feel frustrated by their failure to reduce them all to silence.
So far, the main targets of their picturesque wrath have been moderates who on the whole support the government’s economic policies, but are sceptical about some of the measures it is taking. However, with the battle for Buenos Aires Province looming, this could be about to change. After having dealt with that doddering old fool (or words to that effect) Mauricio Macri and his friends, Milei’s libertarians – also known as “The Forces of Heaven” – are training their guns on Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner and her former protégé Axel Kiciloff. Will their diatribes be accompanied by a judicial onslaught? It would appear that, up to now, Milei likes having Cristina around, which is why his allies in the Senate blocked a bill that would have made it far harder for her to run for office, even in the Buenos Aires Province legislature, but if she starts causing him serious difficulties, he could add his weight to those who want to see her put behind bars for stealing a huge amount of money when in power.
Is Milei’s evident unwillingness to allow anyone who does not idolise him to express his or her thoughts putting a damper on public discourse? It is hard to say, but would be strange if it had no effect. Argentina has a long tradition of self-censorship and it has always been easy for people to find good reasons for refusing to get involved in anything that, by becoming controversial, could cause them serious difficulties in the future.
There is also a growing awareness that what goes online will remain there for decades to come, so it would be better to be careful. This is true not only here but also in countries, among them the US, the UK and those of continental Europe, where freedom of speech is being whittled away by censorious activists or the left, the right and newish combinations of the two such as the “woke” fraternity and sisterhood. As a result, prospects everywhere look increasingly gloomy.
Milei has a habit of shouting “Freedom, damn it!” whenever the opportunity arises, but he is clearly an authoritarian at heart who does not take kindly to criticism. He is certainly not a person who would resist the temptation to follow the example that is being given by the rulers of countries which have long been seen as stalwart defenders of democratic freedoms. Unless he does, however, Argentina could once again become a land in which it would be far riskier to express even minor discrepancies with what the government wants you to think than it has been since that day in December 1983 when, to general relief, a discredited military dictatorship finally called it quits.
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