Article 19, one of the world’s leading NGO’s defending free speech, and the Daily Times, Pakistan’s leading newspaper, launched a movement called Free my Voice. It urged people to fight for the fundamental right of journalists by making them experience the frustration of being robbed of their right to freely express themselves.

On the 17th of April 2016, a provocative article about the Blasphemy Law was anonymously published on the Daily Times website. Its purpose was to stir the conversation by getting people to comment on the issue.

Using the most common medium of self-expression today, people who commented on the article’s comment box experienced how it felt to lose the right to free speech. Each time a person tried to post a comment, an intelligent program analysed it and changed key words to completely alter the meaning of the sentiment. No matter how many attempts a person made, the comment was always altered.

After making people experience how it felt to be stripped off the right to free speech, they were directed to take a stand and make a change by donating to fight for free speech Article 19’s website

As expected, this controversial piece of news got readers to comment. Over 58,590 words / voices were changed to give them a first-hand experience of the censorship journalists go through.

The article created a lot of conversation across various social media channel. Leading dailies covered this effort to make readers aware of the censorship journalists face in Pakistan.

This effort has forced the Pakistan government to relooking at amending the Blasphemy Law.

The Daily Times, one of Pakistan’s leading newspapers published an article about the blasphemy law on their online portal and in their daily copy. The article sparked a national conversation that shifted the focus on how censorship hinders free speech in Pakistan. Other newspapers took notice. They supported the fight towards free speech, and published articles about the situation in Pakistan and the campaign. This reached out to a wider audience and led to a global movement that wants to make a change by giving back the right to free speech of journalists in Pakistan.

Unlike journalists who constantly face censorship in their day-to-day, there are people who enjoy the freedom to share their thoughts and opinions. One medium that these people use to freely voice out what they want to say is

the comment box.

The campaign’s approach was to target the people who are able to freely exercise their right to free speech and make them experience what journalists go through.

Given that the comment box is the most common medium where people share their thoughts and opinions, Free my Voice thought that this was the perfect touch point to raise awareness about the campaign.

The World Press Freedom Index 2015 reveals a decline in the state of press freedom around the world. Journalists are being robbed of their right to free speech. Aside from facing censorship, their lives are constantly in danger.

Despite the prevalence of attacks on journalists’ right to free speech, the world is largely unaware. As an objective, the campaign wanted to raise awareness about the declining state of free speech journalists are facing by targeting individuals who are able to freely express themselves.