Anti-censorship

Anti-censorship is a stance opposed to censorship. Anti-censorship is motivated by philosophical, ethical, political, or religious beliefs.^[1]

Concept

Censorship
Media regulation Books books banned Films banned films Internet circumvention LGBTQ issues Music Postal Press Radio Speech and expression Student media Televisions banned televisions Thought Video games banned video games
Methods Blacklisting Bleeping Book burning Broadcast delay By copyright Cancel culture Censor bars Chilling effect Collateral censorship Concision Conspiracy of silence Content-control software Damnatio memoriae Debanking Financial censorship Deplatforming Euphemism Minced oath Expurgation Fig leaf Fogging Gag order Gatekeeping Hallin's spheres Heckling Heckler's veto Hush money Internet police Malinformation Media blackout Memory hole National intranet News embargo Newspaper theft Non-disclosure agreement Opinion corridor Overton window Pixelization Political correctness Prior restraint Propaganda Purge Redaction Revisionism Sanitization Self-censorship Shadow banning Social rejection Speech code Spiral of silence Strategic lawsuit Super-injunction Surveillance computer and network mass Taboo Whitewashing Word filtering
Contexts AI Algorithmic Chinese censorship abroad Criminal Corporate Apple Facebook Google Hate speech Online Ideological Academic LGBT issues Media bias Moral police Moralistic fallacy Naturalistic fallacy Political censorship Banned parties Political prisoner Propaganda model Religious Blasphemy law Islamic Police Suppression of dissent Systemic bias Wikipedia
By country Censorship by country Blasphemy law Freedom of speech Internet censorship In the Middle East In South Asia
Counterthought and rights Academic freedom Artistic freedom Cognitive liberty Free-culture movement Freedom of information Freedom of speech Freedom of the press Freedom of thought Information wants to be free Intellectual freedom Internet freedom List of freedom indices Right to know Right to protest Right to science and culture Right to truth

Anti-censorship movement is based on the idea that censorship of information and ideas is incompatible with a free society in which individuals pursue happiness.^[2] Early modern writers such as John Locke, John Milton, Voltaire, Adam Smith, and Alexis de Tocquevillee advocated anti-censorship as a means of resisting autocracy. The Areopagitica is known as a major text from that period.^[2]

Criticism of censorship is directed not only at the state but also at corporations such as Big Tech, and can come from both the political right and the left.^[2] Anti-censorship is carried out in the context of defending political freedom of speech, freedom of artistic expression in popular culture such as video games, or civil liberties in sensitive media such as pornography.^[3]

History

During the feminist sex wars of the 1980s, sex-positive feminists established a Feminist Anti-Censorship Task Force to oppose censorship of pornography.^[3]

The Prison Policy Initiative, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the American Booksellers Association, among others, run the Prison Ban Practice, which opposes censorship in prisons.^[4]

In 2025, gamers and game publishers protested financial censorship by Visa and Mastercard on Steam and itch.io.^[5] In 2026, Telegram CEO Pavel Durov called on Russian citizens to stockpile VPNs to counter censorship.^[6]

See also

• National Coalition Against Censorship
• Free-culture movement

References