Stories of the country of the absurd. Stories of the country of contradiction. Mexico today, where freedom of speech and the press live under the pretense of laws that say they defend them. Where for journalists the most common words are fear, silence, death, censorship or a new euphemism: dismissal for “breach of trust”. A reality described in Article 19’s Annual Report about the violence committed against journalists in Mexico. The title says it all: “State of Censure.” A state of defenselessness for human rights defenders, bloggers, tweeters, social and student leaders who live in permanent fear. Because raising a voice to report, disagree, criticize, carries a high risk.The title is not accidental. It invites readers to play with words. State as government that censures, or the state as climate that leads communicators to fall into line, self-censor, mimic the official line. The state of fear that the reprimand can arrive at any moment. And the fear grows daily since 326 attacks were documented against the media in 2014, only four fewer than the previous year.
“respect @epn, or we will hang you by the ass with a meat hook, bitch”; or we are tweeted
“respect our president @epn we are going to kill you, fucking bitch. The PRI arrives even if it hurts.”
In the last two years, assaults on women communicators and documentarians increased 20 percent. They takes a particular form. They attack the dignity, draw ghoulish attention to privacy, use gender as an excuse to trample.
“Here there is no freedom.”
*Denise Dresser is a Mexican political analyst, writer, and university professor. After completing undergraduate work at The College of Mexico, she earned her Ph.D. in Politics at Princeton University. She is currently a faculty member in the Department of Political Science at the Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico (ITAM), where she teaches such courses as Comparative Politics, Political Economy and Contemporary Mexican Politics. She has taught at Georgetown University and the University of California. Twitter: @DeniseDresserG
Sadly, this is nothing new … PEN and various writers associated therewith, have been sending out signals for some time now. Certainly there is more we of the creative communicy can do, from fostering community art and poetry –and even yoga– projects, to raising our voices collectively and individually, in support of the “D-word”: Democracy.
I agree, Ana.
I admire Dresser enormously. Sadly, to read her in Reforma I have to “Subscribe” and pay money. Do you –or does anyone– have a link to a PDF or DOC of the original Spanish?
¡Mil gracias!