From here:
The United Nations General Assembly declared May 3 to be World Press Freedom Day or just World Press Day to raise awareness of the importance of freedom of the press and remind governments of their duty to respect and uphold the right to freedom of expression enshrined under Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and marking the anniversary of the Declaration of Windhoek, a statement of free press principles put together by African newspaper journalists in 1991.
There are a number of comments I could make about this but I don’t want to make my lawyer cry.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
—
Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms Under the heading of “Fundamental Freedoms” the section states:
“ 2. Everyone has the following fundamental freedoms:
(a) freedom of conscience and religion;
(b) freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression, including freedom of the press and other media of communication;
(c) freedom of peaceful assembly; and
(d) freedom of association.
Unfortunately it also states:
1. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.
and “reasonable limits” has shown itself to be extremely subjective, usually being interpreted in such a manner as to allow anything and everything “liberal” and to disallow anything and everything “conservative”. For example you can pretty much say anything you want about a woman’s right to have an abortion, but there are rather serious restrictions on your rights to say anything about the right to life of the child who is still in its mother’s womb.