Fear of Freedom

I find it deliciously ironic that I was robbed at Lenin Square in Hanoi.

One day in Vietnam, I switched off all my online profiles.

My Facebook, Twitter and other online profiles were made private, suspended or deleted. It seems a bit melodramatic, but at the time I was petrified. I think it’s a bit silly actually, because looking back, I can declare with certainty that:

• I have never made any comments of a seditious nature against the Vietnamese Government
• I have never participated in any acts of dissidence against the Vietnamese Government
• I have not joined any groups with an interest in overthrowing the Vietnamese Government

So why did I panic and go underground?

It comes back to what used to be my ‘greatest fear’; to be lost in a foreign country with no job, no money, no contacts.

My wallet was stolen in Hanoi and I thought everything was fine (I froze my cards, had emergency cash and my precious passport), but things got weird when I was emailed by a ‘concerned mother’ who wanted to return my wallet. It was an obvious (and common) scam and I knew better than to fall prey.

I made it clear I wasn’t going to hand over my cash, but they started to harass me on Facebook. That’s when I freaked out. The blackmailers were one degree of separation away from my blogs and twitter. In my wallet was also my hotel card and my Australian address. My online and physical presence was known.

I was worried about my tweets because they could have been misinterpreted. In Australia we challenge the status quo as we wish, but in Vietnam there is no such thing as peaceful dissidence and one does not simply challenge the the Government.

Despite many young Vietnamese telling me ‘do as you wish here, it’s a free country’ there is a big difference to the Australian interpretation of the word ‘freedom’.

Having said that, the need to be careful of what you tweet is not just something you should be wary of in the East. In London there have been two cases of arrest and prosecution over a Tweet. All over the world it seems like freedom of speech is fast fading.

Hot and Cold, Cut and Uncut

I’m hot and cold when it comes to Katy Perry’s music.

Yet she’s considered sizzling here and is a headline acts at Singapore Singfest music festival.

Her claim to fame in Australia was I Kissed A Girl. Depending on who you talk to in Australia, it’s considered both a pro- and anti- gay song by the gay community. In Singapore however, the locals didn’t get to decide for themselves because the song was banned altogether from radio and TV, allegedly for implicit references to unnatural sex.

Rumour has it the censors originally simply bleeped the word “kissed” to make the song less unsavory - but that would have left us with a rather amusing lyric:

“I #@%ed a girl and I liked it”

Censorship is a hot topic here with songs, films, theatre shows and artworks banned or artists forced to make cuts to remove elements the government watchdog does not approve of. Local consumers are becoming very cold to the process because what is supposedly done in the name of good sometimes seems arbitrary or even unnecessary.

When the crowd at Singfest sang I Kissed a Girl with Perry word for word, it showed that censorship is also completely ineffective too.

Let Me Decide is a campaign by Arts Engage calling for the current system of censorship to be replaced by regulation that enables art to be produced as intended by the artist. Let Me Decide wants creative works to remain uncut and give the consumer the right to watch it, hear it or be involved in it. Or not – the choice should lie with the individual.

I’m sold, I too prefer it uncut.