PEN America

Articles by PEN America

27 March 2019. Artists mark World Theatre Day in Istanbul, Turkey, even though the event was banned by the government and a number of artists were facing restrictions and censorship. Erhan Demirtas/NurPhoto via Getty Images

PEN America report details crackdown on creative voices in Turkey

The new report outlines the legal mechanisms that the Turkish government has used to silence writers, activists, artists, academics, and creative professionals over the past five years.

A phone running the settings app is seen in this photo illustration on 9 July 2018, Jaap Arriens/NurPhoto

Dark patterns, web design, and free expression

PEN America – along with Consumer Reports, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Access Now, and others – launched the Dark Patterns Tip Line, a website where anyone can share examples of the websites that confuse and coerce us into making decisions or agreeing to terms that we wouldn’t otherwise.

A woman walks past a mural depicting a 'seeing eye', in Los Angeles, California, 20 November 2011, Lawrence K. Ho/Los Angeles Times

Three ways social media companies can disarm abusive users

“To protect the victims and ensure their voices are not silenced, social media companies must actively discourage abuse and hold abusive users accountable – but in ways that do not themselves infringe on freedom of expression.”

Police officers block protesters during a demonstration against Turkey's withdrawal from the Istanbul Convention, an international accord designed to protect women, in Istanbul, 20 March 2021, BULENT KILIC/AFP via Getty Images

PEN America launches its Freedom to Write Index 2020

During 2020, according to data collected for PEN America’s Freedom to Write Index, at least 273 writers, academics, and public intellectuals in 35 countries – in all geographic regions around the world – were in prison or unjustly held in detention in connection with their writing, their work, or related activism.

Kiev, Ukraine, 11 October 2020. A protester holds a placard depicting Russian President Vladimir Putin and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko during a demonstration in solidarity with the protest movement in Belarus, Pavlo Gonchar/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

Writer and Belarusian PEN member Aliaksandr Fiaduta must be released

Fiaduta was detained in Russia, reportedly by the Belarusian KGB. Fiaduta is being detained without access to legal counsel or medical care and no charge against him is listed.

An NGO employee speaks during a call on a hotline dedicated to abortion, a topic that can result in harassment, in Peshawar, Pakistan, 17 December 2018, ABDUL MAJEED/AFP via Getty Images

Online abuse and the threat it poses to free speech

Viktorya Vilk, PEN America’s program director of Digital Safety and Free Expression, discusses how online abuse directly affects freedom of speech as well as the different ways social media companies can stem online abuse and support their abused users.

Minsk, Belarus, 12 November 2020. People lay flowers to pay tribute to Raman Bandarenka, a protester who had been beaten to death the previous day, STRINGER/AFP via Getty Images

Belarus: Well known literary translator Volha Kalackaja sentenced to two years’ house arrest

After spending two months in pre-trial detention, Kalackaja was convicted of “hooliganism”. She had allegedly slapped a state journalist who was harassing passersby and questioning civilians’ ability to grieve for artist Raman Bandarenka, who was beaten to death by security forces in November.

Representatives of Human Rights First, PEN America, POMED, CPJ and others gather in front of the Embassy of Saudi Arabia in Washington, DC, 2 October 2019, to remember Jamal Khashoggi, OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images

US must hold Mohammed bin Salman accountable for Jamal Khashoggi’s murder, rights groups say

In response to the release of a U.S. congressional report identifying Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as having ordered the operation against journalist Jamal Khashoggi, rights groups call on the Biden administration to impose sanctions on the prince, and suspend arms sales.