The Pros And Cons Of Censorship

When people think of America, it’s the “land of the free” and the bearer of the first amendment, which only emphasizes upon America’s freedom even more so. Within the 1st Amendment, we have freedom of religion, the press, to petition, to peacefully assemble, and most importantly, the freedom of speech. But, like most laws, there is the small print which will limit the exact amount of your freedom that is allowed to flourish. The censorship America experiences is subliminal, hidden between layers and layers of declarations of free speech and the ability to say whatever you want. You receive the freedom to spread words of hate, such as the Ku Klux Klan and the Westboro Baptist Church, and have the ability to say whatever person opinions you feel

So maybe we can’t say exactly what we want on a day to day basis. But if you’re apart of a corporation, say, the press, you should be able to print the truth with whichever biases the paper you write for supports, right? Wrong. Despite the statement of the apparent freedom of press, in the Press Freedom Index of 2013, which observes what is released in the news across the world and ranks how much freedom of speech each country permits in newspapers, the US is not number 1. Nor is it number 2, 3, or even 10. No, the US ranks as the 32nd country with the most freedom of press, meaning that 31 other countries have less censorship than the apparent “freedom capital.” While there are countries, such as China, Russia, and others where the censorship is far more intense, the fact that America claims to have no limits upon your opinions and then continues to censor you according to what corporations want the public to know is equally concerning. The government is effectively faking the general public into believing that the censorship is minimal, and that all opinions and views are