Eleutheromania

Eleutheromania: An intense and irresistible desire for freedom

Yesterday while I tried to browse through blogs here, I constantly kept getting this message across the page,”the content is prohibited for viewership from within Pakistan” and with an exasperated sigh I had to go dig the issue up only to find that for some security reasons WordPress has been temporarily banned. I was upset, confused and enraged and emotions exhaust me. They always did, I prefer being indifferent. It’s been over twelve hours and I still feel ‘wronged’. 

I’m not sure I understand how our censorship policies work here and I’m certain if I asked anybody, all I’d get is a shrug of shoulders or perhaps even a seething look from one of the oh-so-patriots, “it’s a matter of national security child, what’s wrong with you?!” so I thought I’d use whatever access I still have in my hands to TELL what’s bothering me so much for after all it’s just a site, right?

Wrong. This place isn’t just a site for me, in the few months that I have been here I have come across amazing people from across the globe, I have made friends from different countries and religions. It’s this place which defies boundaries for me, this place which states that there is nothing like the power of words and honesty that can connect people, to quote Tennessee Williams, “If the writing is honest it cannot be separated from the man who wrote it”  and I personally believe that we all leave ourselves, bit by bit, in words we write. If you look closely enough, you will find a hint of shadow of the person in the words they spill here for all to see.

What gnaws at me most is that I’m drained out by the policies and stands this country seems to have. We face a plethora of challenges, from basic human rights to national security issues, you name it and we have it. It’s depressing to see this home falling apart like the walls crumbling down around you as you watch with hopelessness and despair. What was once built on a dream has been butchered by it’s own people using the sharpest knives ensuring that the dream is shredded so badly that no one ever dares to dream again here.

This isn’t the first time they have banned a site, YouTube was banned back years ago because of the incompetence and failure of the government to be able to filter offensive content from viewing within the country, while the issue of what’s offensive and degrading for us is another debate altogether, what’s worse is that masses have to suffer for a handful of ignorant people. Again, from time to time we have had other sites (Twitter, Facebook etc) banned on the same grounds each time and now this WordPress has been banned too ‘temporarily’

My question remains though is how is this a solution to anything? Where is my freedom of speech? Why should I be denied my rights just because the higher ups want to bury the issues than resolve them? How long will we keep piling up problems instead of solving them? Of all the days today I feel eleutheromania clawing at me much more viciously than any other regular day, the irony of the situation is that today, 23rd of March, Pakistan resolution was passed, the decision that we wanted an independent country was cemented. The roots for our freedom were laid out in history today, 75 years ago. I rest my case.