An art exhibit held at the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP) provoked controversy and debate about freedom of expression in the Philippines. Enough people were shocked and offended by the work that the CCP agreed to close it down. Apparently, freedom of expression has gone too far in the Philippines and the devout should not have to suffer such sacrilege.
Personally, I find this kind of so-called 'art' distasteful and a waste of time. However, we do not have freedom of expression in the Philippines, as this case clearly shows. If someone more powerful than you doesn't want your message to get out, they have many methods at their disposal to have you shut up. That is not freedom of expression, only lip-service to freedom.
The best way to deal with this kind of thing is to simply ignore it. After all, what the exhibitors crave is attention and by making a big deal of it, you give them exactly what they want. I would never have heard of the exhibition if it weren't for the furor involved in having it shut down.
A friend of mine asked if it was right to invoke freedom of expression no matter how obnoxious or objectionable the message was to others. The real question is who gets to decide what is obnoxious and objectionable? In Jacobean England, Catholics were repressed; in the USSR, religion itself was objectionable; in Mao's China, intellectuals and professionals were intolerable.
Freedom is one of those few things that must be absolute; it must apply to everyone otherwise it may be taken away from anyone. Today we may be the elites who get to decide what is tolerable. What about tomorrow?
In a free society, people may choose to ignore those views with which they disagree. Dissenting voices are not silenced, no matter how distasteful they are to the mainstream.
Does that mean chaos should reign and people can incite violence? No. Oliver Wendell Holmes said so aptly, "The right to swing my fist ends where the other man's nose begins." But holding an art exhibition is not swinging one's fist at another's nose.
