THIS REFERS to the ban on YouTube by the PTA on the advice of the government.
Even though violence after the release of the blasphemous video on YouTube is condemnable, it must be realised that the ban on YouTube has adverse effects on students.
I use YouTube for my MBA studies. As a result of this ban in Pakistan, informative and academic videos are not available to aspirants of higher education as well.
By banning YouTube, we are effectively prohibiting spread of knowledge and information. By keeping such material off the people, what are we going to gain? If the objective is for the hate speech to cease, that wont happen. Pakistan simply doesnt figure as big enough to worry about in the equation for giants such as Google and the various stakeholders.
By banning YouTube, the subsequent inability for Pakistanis to access academic material is a gross injustice to the core injunctions of Islam itself, the essence of which may be summarised by Iqra.
Yet, I prefer to request the authorities to lift the ban on YouTube so that everybody could be able to benefit from this electronic library.
Rafay Bin Ali @Karachi