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Pakistan Blocks Youtube and Facebook

Posted by Sheela Venero 4:28 PM

by Sheela Venero of Drawnlines Politics.

This week Pakistan ordered a web ban on sites such as Youtube and Facebook. These are sites that the Pakistan Government have decried are offensive to the religion of Islam. The issue that ignited this ban was a Facebook group titled: “Everybody Draw Mohammed Day”. In Islam any depiction of the prophet Mohammed is blasphemy, even positive ones.

So this one Facebook group sparked an entire country to not only shut down Facebook but other similar social networking sites. Pakistan also shut down blackberry service for about 10 hours, in order to keep anyone from accessing Facebook Mobile.

The creators of “Everybody Draw Mohammed Day” have stated on their page that the purpose of the group is not to “slander the average Muslim…We simply want to show the extremists that threaten to harm people because of Mohammed depictions, that we are not afraid of them”. Counter Facebook groups have been created and protests have broken out in Pakistan where signs stating “Shame on Western Media” have been displayed.

Muslim sentiment on the issue has been divided. On one side, some Muslims were offended by the group and the intentional disrespect that was created in promoting depictions of Mohammed. Other Muslims were shocked by Pakistan’s solution to the issue; arguing that the country has not only cut the flow of information and communication but has hampered intellectual growth.
As Americans, we sometimes take for granted our ability to speak freely. Let this be another reason why America is a great country, even our Canadian neighbors do not have the same free speech laws that we do.

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