Özet:

Political blogging has been claimed to be one of the ‘tsunami’ forces that has changed the political terrain in Malaysia.  Apart from being the source of alternative, independent, and rapid news/reports/opinions, political blogs have encouraged the public to exercise their freedom of expression both online and in other settings.  Political blogging altered the BarisanNasional domination in the Sarawak State Election of2011 and the Malaysian General Elections of 2008 and 2004. These events may, on the one hand, signal a healthy democratic development. Uncontrollable freedom may, on the other hand, undermine the security of society.  Thus, the Sedition Act (1948), the Internal Security Act (1960), the Copyright Act (1987), the Computer Crimes Act (1997), and the Communications and Multimedia Act (1998) are some of the legal tools that can be utilized against political bloggers.  Some have argued that the real rationale behind the control of political blogging is not the protection of the nation’s security; instead, these acts and the state’s filtering apparatus are the ‘silencing’ tools used by the government to halt political bloggers from challenging it and its policies.  This paper further analyses this argument by employing qualitative methods.  By scrutinizing in-depth interviews with political bloggers, legal documents, and other secondary data, it reveals that the Malaysian government does not utilize the state’s filtering apparatus specifically to obstruct political bloggers from expressing their views.  Ironically, ignorance of the law and the ethics of political bloggers are the real culprits that shape the perceived stigma of ‘government-silencing-tools’.

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