*All images taken from the Uncensored Library press release kit
When countries ban literature, censor and murder journalists, and block websites and apps containing certain information, free speech and the sharing of ideas becomes limited. The people’s narrative becomes controlled and prevents the truth from being spoken and shared.
While censorship is the death of knowledge and thought, censorship also leads people to develop creative and innovative ways to navigate around the suppression of intellectual freedom.
On March 12, 2020, Reporters without Borders in conjunction with BlockWorks, worked to develop a Minecraft server titled, Uncensored Library, that hosts banned materials from around the world.
Minecraft is a videogame that allows the player to create vast worlds; it’s a type of sandbox game that allows unlimited creativity from the player. Players have taken this platform and created a library that hosts restricted materials, preserving them for future generations.
In the Minecraft server, there are several wings dedicated to countries that have censored materials and other books. Each wing contains a library filled with in-game Minecraft books, which contain the censored journalism. Visitors can join the server and virtually visit the wings and access the materials. In countries that experience censorship but still allow the game, players have found a loophole in which media can remain uncensored and out of the government’s hands, by transcribing the text into in-game Minecraft books.
In the Uncensored Library, there are wings dedicated to Iran, Russia, Vietnam, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Egypt, and Brazil, Eritrea, and Belarus have been added as of 2021.
The Uncensored Library pays homage to murdered journalists like Javier Valdez Cardenas, who was killed for reporting on corruption and cartel activity in Mexico, and Jamal Khashoggi, who was killed by the Saudi government in retaliation for articles he wrote that criticized the Saudi government.
Uncensored Library states, “Let’s empower the next generation to stand up for their right to information and give them a powerful tool to fight oppressive leaders: knowledge. Together with the ever-expanding gaming community, we will show the world that the truth will never be silenced!”
To visit the Uncensored Library you can go here.
While the Uncensored Library establishes a location where players can view uncensored materials, there are still countries where the games sales are restricted, downloads are inaccessible, or the application is altered to an “acceptable” edition.
