Yesterday I attended a conference organized by students at Zayed University titled "Emirates Media Freedom." The purpose of the conference was to discuss the current state of the UAE media and its future. The conference was quite impressive and reflected very well on the students who organized it.
The panelists were mostly Emiratis and included journalists, media executives and educators. The discussion was lively and quite heated at times. As the entire conference was in Arabic, English-speakers relied on an audio translator which I am sure skewed a bit the substance of the conversation. Despite being on a Saturday, the conference was well-attended and most attendees stayed for the entire day.
I thought the perspectives on "press freedom" were fascinating. My perception was that there was an overall uneasiness around censorship. Many speakers cited the rise of Web 2.0 and other forms of self-expression as evidence that the Internet cannot successfully be censored in the long-term. This sentiment, however, did not imply that there was a total openness to embrace new media. Rather, the responsibility for censorship appeared to fall on the individual and his or her family. The idea of a "moral ceiling" recurred quite a bit, with regards to conveying to one's children boundaries with media consumption and for journalists, ensuring that certain barriers aren't crossed in researching and writing stories.
The general consensus appeared to be that media was 'free' in the UAE, assuming that one accepted the 'moral ceiling' previously mentioned. Three elements were emphasized as existing outside the realm of acceptable journalism in the UAE: Disrespect for religion or its prophets, pornography, and the intent to foster the formation of political parties. One speaker was more specific about the idea of internal criticism, claiming that the UAE media was not free because outlets lacked the ability to be critical. Government criticism, while not explicitly stated, seemed to be included in the list of no no's.
In all honesty, the conference made my head spin quite a bit as I had a hard time following all of the logic behind the various speaker's arguments. That said, it revealed very important perspectives on the notion of a free press, most of which are at odds with critics of the UAE media, who often come from outside the UAE and aren't UAE nationals. I think these learnings are important:
1. Cultural values always supercede media-generated ones. External media must be monitored to ensure that UAE youth are "protected" and given an appropriate media compass to navigate with.
2. Government responsibility is development of its people, economically and socially. Citizen criticism should be communicated directly to government, not through media channels.
3. Arabic-language press is censored differently from English-language, and generally Arabic-press faces greater limits.
4. External criticism in the press is tolerated. There was no discussion of why external governments are so consistently criticized in the UAE media.
5. Self-censorship is valued, but general censorship is not. The same individual who spoke of developing self-imposed media boundaries (especially for children) was responsible for bringing MTV to the UAE.
