Daily Times

The Daily Mail, UK, reported: “Pakistan has threatened to ban Google from the country over an ongoing row about ‘blasphemous’ content on YouTube. The new Minister for IT and Telecommunications Anusha Rahman said unless YouTube, which is owned by Google, complies in removing clips that are deemed anti-Islamic it will block access to the search engine. The video sharing website has been banned in Pakistan for nine months after bosses at the internet giant refused to remove a trailer for low-budget film The Innocence of Muslims. An alleged tweet on June 13, 2013, by the ‘Pioneer Ban-Imposer’ Rehman Malik said: “I submitted a calling at notice in the Senate/Govt to inform deadline to unblock YouTube/ to install software for anti-religious material.”
Everyone! Please, ‘Google’ both these reports, hurry, while it still works! For those of us whose memory still serves them a tad well, despite their aging brain pathways, of course helped in the zillions by none other than ‘Google’, we would see that Malik, the renowned ‘banana-apple-man’, banned YouTube and threatened to ban Google and then kept on issuing deadlines for lifting the ban! Now, none other than Malik himself has allegedly submitted a call attention notice to unblock the very site he himself blocked. And not only that, he has miraculously discovered ‘software’ that can be installed to block unwanted content! Praise to the Lord, maybe Malik actually ‘Google-d’ the solution, now that he does not have the fate of the nation resting on his poor shoulders!
Then there is the incident of a female legislator from the ruling party who allegedly assaulted a bus hostess in Sargodha, bringing back memories of the infamous Waheeda Shah of PPP. The news caught on like a bush fire on the media and got repeated hits on Google, prompting the Punjab chief minister to take notice, which resulted in the release of the arrested ‘victim’ hostess. Hats off to the people of Pakistan for standing up against the high-handedness of the ‘powerful’, though it still needs to be determined what exactly happened, as the bus hostess herself admitted counter-hitting the MPA. Seems like a catfight blown out of proportion, perhaps?
Miles away in England meanwhile, we discover via Google that the food goddess, Nigella Lawson, was assaulted publicly by her husband, Charles Saatchi, who choked her repeatedly at a London restaurant and no one intervened. It transpires that violence is not that out of character for Saatchi; his ex-wife got divorced on the grounds of ‘abusive behaviour’ and the ‘other woman’ (Lawson was the other woman). But the question that bothers me is why does the ‘goddess’ put up with abuse? If women like Lawson, who are Oxford-educated, rich and informed, hail from privileged backgrounds, who should serve as role models, put up with domestic violence (DV), how does one expect uneducated and poor women to say ‘no’? Lawson did not even lodge a complaint against Saatchi. A much flouted concept is ‘women’s empowerment’. ‘Empowerment’ is supposed to be the game changer, but then what about ‘role models’ of perceived ‘empowerment’ and their responsibility and/or ability to defeat abuse? I am not blaming the victim here but I am definitely questioning what ‘empowering’ women actually means? How does one plan to stop DV? Is it by telling men not to abuse women or by telling the media to report it differently? Does one seriously expect men to stop hitting women by ‘educating’ them into modifying their behaviour? No. Unless and until women like Lawson, who are already empowered, rise to the occasion and do their bit in life and say ‘no’ to abuse, DV will go on, because it’s about women’s behaviour too. One surely cannot expect men to stop hitting women if the women do not take a stand. The fact that no one intervened while the assault happened is sad. At least in Pakistan they still have the decency to jump in, especially at a public place like a restaurant. In spite of what our country is portrayed to be, all a woman has to do is scream and everybody comes running, barring armed assaults of course.
Another factor that is thought to contribute to domestic violence is the lack of ‘gender equality’, but just Google Lawson. She went to the best university, has money, fame, brains and looks, and is fortunate enough to have the best of everything. There are millions of men out there who do not even come close to her in anything, so who is she ‘equal’ to? The good thing about the DV law in England is that even if a victim does not lodge a complaint the Crown Prosecution Services (CPS) steps in to prosecute the offender. Scotland Yard was still making inquiries into the Lawson-Saatchi incident when Saatchi decided to accept a ‘police caution’ as an alternative to be investigated. A simple ‘caution’ is a formal warning given in Britain to a suspect who admits to the offence or against whom the police have sufficient evidence. A ‘conditional caution’ requires that the offender comply with all of the conditions attached to the caution. In both cases the offender can be prosecuted if he violates the caution. According to the CPS, a caution is a serious matter and is recorded by the police and may be cited in subsequent court proceedings, representing one form of entry into the criminal justice system. A conditional caution is not available for DV and hate crimes, and Saatchi has accepted a caution for assault. It is ironic how the author of the award winning book How to be a Domestic Goddess has fallen prey to domestic violence.
The citizens of Pakistan have constitutional rights that guarantee them the right to freedom of speech and expression, and freedom of the press. Every citizen has the right to have access to information in all matters of public importance; every citizen has the right to life, which encompasses more than just being able to breathe. It is our inalienable right to have access to technology and information to be at par with the world outside our little oyster. We are taught that the Prophet (PBUH) walked the same path where an infidel threw garbage on him daily. We never heard that he changed his route ever. There are over seven billion people in this world; is it possible for our government to control the actions, words and thoughts of every one of them to conform to ours? A common mistake parents make while training their children is that instead of teaching them not to touch things, they just put the stuff out of reach. Threatening to ban Google is on a similar footing.
Mike Royko, a Chicago columnist, is quoted as saying: “It’s been my policy to view the Internet not as an ‘information highway’ but as an electronic asylum filled with babbling loonies!” Conceding that the internet has its fair share of loonies as much as the real world, it still has immense information potential, all at the touch of a fingertip! We can Google’ images of a ‘banana’ and an ‘apple’, we can search for software that blocks unwanted content, we can dig up juicy gossip, and life-changing, thought provoking content side by side. The choice is ours and should be ours. Apart from making us a laughing stock in the world, threatening to ban Google is nothing but twaddle speak!

The writer is an advocate of the High Court