Daily Times

On December 14, 2015, the online New York Times published a news story titled ‘Thai man may go to prison for insulting king’s dog’. Evidently, a Thai worker was charged with ‘disparaging’ the aforementioned dog in an internet post and he will be tried in a military court for this heinous crime. As I read this bit of news I really felt quite happy about the way things are in Pakistan. At least nobody has to worry about writing sarcastic things about dogs. Other things yes, but dogs, no, even if it is a dog belonging to some high and mighty personage. As an ‘opinion’ writer I have to be careful not to insult anybody, especially if they have the power to kill, maim or at least cause much trouble for those who say things they do not like. However, I must at least accept that the Thais are going to try this dog disparager in a court rather than ‘taking care’ of him in other ways.

Personally, I am a great believer in self-censorship. After all, he who runs away lives to fight another day. More importantly, as an old fashioned liberal I find it difficult to create and sustain enough anger at anyperson or institution to write against them repeatedly and in a perpetually virulent fashion. Other than perhaps one person in the history of Pakistan I have always believed that most of our ‘leaders’at some intrinsic level actually want to do something to make things better for the people of this country. It reminds me of advice reportedly given to a freshman US senator by a senior colleague many years ago;you can criticise the actions but not the motives of your political opponents. I have, over the years, followed essentially a similar policy about expressing opinions about politics and politicians in Pakistan. That said, there are people in positions of power who are so thin-skinned that they cannot tolerate even the slightest criticism of their actions.

In this connection, whatever his other faults might be, I admire Asif Ali Zardari, the former president of Pakistan. When he was in power he never took any action against those who attacked him on political, personal and even moral grounds. His perpetual smile in the face of all criticism perhaps did more to drive his enemies to desperation than anything else he might have done. Other than a dictator or a leader pursuing a cult of personality, the best thing that can and should be done in the face of genuine criticism is to accept it and, if appropriate, respond to it in a reasonable fashion. For a politician or a ‘leader’ the ability to accept criticism is a sign of intellectual strength and the lack thereof a sign of doubt that the policy they are pursuing is not the right one.

The reason why democracy is thought to be a good system of government is primarily because there is no true ‘supreme’ leader. In a parliamentary system, the very concept of a Prime Minister (PM) is that, among the ‘kings ministers’, he or she is the first among equals (primus inter pares). A cabinet is essentially a group of equally important people among whom one is chosen to lead them. What that of course means is that the PM can be criticised by other cabinet members and has to accept that criticism, and only proceed when the cabinet agrees to a particular plan of action. Also, every general election is a free for all as far as criticism is concerned. The reason why Pakistan does not have a true democracy yet is not because of the ‘military civilian’ imbalance but because the Pakistani PM essentially functions as a great leader beyond criticism and unwilling to accept divergent opinions.

Of course, when a military leader takes over the country(and that has happened often enough), he is accustomed to having all ‘subordinates’ accept his commands without question. And a general president considers members of all the different branches of government as his subordinates as he would members of the military. As we all know, under military rule Pakistan had no freedom of press or of ‘expression’. It is true that under General Musharraf the media was allowed to expand. Yet, I do not thinkhe allowed the press or the electronic media complete independence. However, having written for this newspaper during those days I can say that I was often critical of General Musharraf and I must admit that it was not his government but rather the subsequently ‘democratically’ elected government that found my opinions a trifle too critical.

Pakistan is often given as an example of a country where journalists are most at risk. But at the same time most of us who write for newspapers like this are relatively immune. The reason often given for that immunity is that most ‘ordinary’ people in Pakistan cannot read English language newspapers. As such, people in positions of power do not really care too much about what the English language press has to say since the ‘masses’ never read such stuff. That I must admit is entirely true about most of the people in positions of power. But people in positions of power have minions that scan all newspapers in any language to see if their masters are being criticised excessively. So, when somebody writing for a newspaper like this catches the eye of a person in power, it is always a minion that brings it up.

It was not the king of Thailand who was surfing the net and accidently found out that some ordinary person was being sarcastic about his dog. It was obviously some low-level underling trying to make some boss happy. People high up on the VVIP scale in Pakistan also have underlings looking out for the ‘good name’ of their masters. That is how the cookie crumbles.

The author is a former editor of the Journal of Association of Pakistani descent Physicians of North America (APPNA)