By Deepthy Menon, Strategy and Narratives Facilitator, Urgent Action Fund Asia and Pacific
Across Southeast Asia, artists and cultural rights defenders are increasingly being cast as threats – to public morality, political order and dominant narratives about gender, sexuality, identity and belonging.
This is especially true for queer and trans artists, whose bodies, stories and performances often challenge the boundaries that states, religious authorities and conservative movements seek to impose. When their work is censored, surveilled or attacked, the consequences reach beyond artistic freedom. They touch the foundations of civic space: the right to speak, gather, remember, imagine and contest power.
Read more on The Diplomat
Photo credit: REUTERS/Yen Duong
