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Kirsten Han Profile picture
Kirsten Han
@kixes
🇸🇬 Journalist, writer and activist. Champion of clauses. Author of The Singapore I Recognise: Essays on home, community and hope (Ethos Books, 2023)
2 subscribers
Nov 8, 2022 • 16 tweets • 5 min read
🧵 on Twitter and Mu*k, from the perspective of a journalist/activist from #Singapore (me)

1/ I am from a country that has significant issues with civil, political, and human rights. But my government also puts significant effort into public relations to bolster its reputation. 2/ I'm constantly meeting people who have no idea that, in #Singapore, you can be arrested for holding up a placard in public. That 11 men have been executed this year for #drugs. That we have serious issues with press freedom and media diversity.
Aug 21, 2022 • 10 tweets • 5 min read
As expected before #ndr2022:

#Singapore will finally repeal Section 377A (which criminalises sex between men), while also undermining the main point of repealing Section 377A by enshrining the discrimination against #LGBTQ people elsewhere

channelnewsasia.com/singapore/ndr-… Once the Constitution is amended it's going to be freakin' hard to change it again. And as Lee himself points out, this is not just about marriage. It affects housing, education, who gets to be recognised as next-of-kin, even advertising and film codes (media censorship).
Aug 4, 2022 • 44 tweets • 9 min read
🧵 I’ve been sharing updates but wanted to put together a thread covering the substantive points of the Court of Appeal hearing today (well, yesterday now) involving 24 death row prisoners in #Singapore

#DeathPenalty #StopTheKilling On 1 August, 24 death row prisoners filed an originating claim against the state, in relation to their right to access to justice. They claimed that the practice of handing out punitive cost orders against lawyers have deterred lawyers from taking on late-stage capital cases.
Aug 4, 2022 • 10 tweets • 3 min read
The judgement will be delivered at 7:30pm. #DeathPenalty #StopTheKilling It’s 8:51pm and the judges haven’t returned yet. There was just an announcement that it will be about 20 minutes or so longer. 😣

Lots of anxious families right now, none more so than Abdul Rahim’s loved ones, who are waiting to find out if he will be granted a stay.
Aug 4, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
It’s been about an hour since the court stood down to deliberate the appeal brought by 24 death row prisoners against the High Court striking out their civil suit relating to their right to access to justice. The hearing is conducted on Zoom so the 24 are calling in from prison. On multiple screens in the courtroom you can see the Zoom gallery. 24 of those little rectangles are the death row prisoners, representing themselves because they don’t have a lawyer to represent them in this application.
Jun 24, 2022 • 13 tweets • 4 min read
Okay, finally got access. If I understood what happened to me in interrogation correctly, after this morning there are now *more* offences that @justanotherock and I are on the hook for. Just going to sum it up as best I can… The original 2 alleged offences that @justanotherock and I were questioned for this morning were: (1) when 4 of us hung out outside Changi Prison chatting the night of Kahar was executed, and (2) when we took photos outside of prison a couple of nights before Nagen was hanged. Image
Apr 4, 2022 • 30 tweets • 10 min read
🧵 A thread to share the speech (with some edits to fit Twitter limits) that I gave in Hong Lim Park yesterday at the protest against the #deathpenalty in #Singapore, with further references in [ ].

⬇️⬇️⬇️ Thank you all for coming down today, despite the rain and the damp and the humidity.

By showing up, you’ve demonstrated your opposition to state violence in all our names.
Apr 3, 2022 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
This morning I worried that few people would show, especially because it rained earlier. When the government repeatedly says there’s overwhelming support for the #deathpenalty, it can make you feel very alone and on the fringe. Thank you to every single person who came today. Members of Abdul Kahar's family attended the protest today. They, too, said that the turn-out was larger than they'd expected. Kahar's younger brother, Abdul Mutalib, told me, "It is over for my brother. Now we fight for everyone else."
Apr 3, 2022 • 7 tweets • 3 min read
So heartened by the crowd today. #AbolishDeathPenalty Just warming up with chanting! “This is a community not very used to protesting” so going to practice some more 😅
Mar 17, 2022 • 83 tweets • 27 min read
🧵 The @acadsingapore webinar on the war in #Ukraine is about to start! academia.sg/academic-views… I'll be live-tweeting as much as I can in this thread.

You can also watch it live on YouTube: @acadsingapore .@cheriangeorge kicking things off: "There's a widespread sense that this war in Eastern Europe is some kind of historical milestone... but on the way to what?" Don't know yet, but we do know that there are power shifts and events in Ukraine are "triggering complex reactions".
Dec 28, 2021 • 19 tweets • 5 min read
Speaking of the Social Development Network (the rebranded name after they merged the initiatives for graduates [SDU] and non-graduates [SDS]), for a long time I meant to write a @wethecitizenssg special issue about the time I went on an SDN-accredited speed dating session… …but I never actually finished the issue because it didn’t feel like there was really quite enough to tell to make it a full newsletter issue.

On Twitter, though…
Nov 4, 2021 • 19 tweets • 9 min read
THREAD 🧵

As an anti-#deathpenalty activist and someone supporting Nagen’s family at this time, I’d like to respond to this horrific statement from #Singapore’s Ministry of Home Affairs. 👇🏼 Firstly: while the MHA statement rehashes what the courts said about Nagen’s actions being “the working of a criminal mind”, what *isn’t* disputed is that Nagen’s IQ is only 69, he has borderline intellectual functioning, ADHD, and his executive functioning skills are impaired.
Sep 16, 2021 • 18 tweets • 4 min read
I know that many people have different opinions and criticism of The Online Citizen. I don't want to dissect all the things that have been said about TOC. Instead, I'd like to reflect on the impact it's had not just on Singapore, but on individuals like myself.

A thread... I joined TOC as a volunteer in 2010. Believe me when I say I was green—a complete blur-blur rookie. I was only just beginning to show an interest in socio-political issues. There was so much I didn't know, from the ins and outs of Singapore politics to how to write news reports.
Sep 8, 2021 • 18 tweets • 8 min read
As a layperson, trying to follow #Singapore’s #Covid19 messaging since early 2020 has become incredibly confusing and just so damn exhausting.

This is a Covid fatigue thread/rant. We’ve been praised for our handling of the pandemic (despite some serious fuck-ups, like with the migrant worker dormitories), but if you’re living in Singapore trying to follow the comms, it’s mind-boggling.
Jul 7, 2021 • 22 tweets • 11 min read
1/ At various times over 2020/21, there’s been interest in #Singapore’s response to #Covid19. I think people outside SG see a lot of surface-level stuff and end up projecting their own opinions/desires onto our measures.

A 🧵 to unpack some of Singapore’s Covid response so far. 2/ Recently, there was excitement (outside SG) about how SG said #Covid19 will be endemic, and will move away from quarantines/border closures/focus on daily case counts. This was used to support arguments that Covid is “like the flu” and restrictions elsewhere should be lifted.
Jul 1, 2021 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
This reminds me of the time I was talking to a group of university students about "fake news" and one said that China's Great Firewall might be a good idea because then they keep all the external "fake news" out and only need to worry about dealing with internal "fake news". Among younger Singaporeans, I wonder how much attention or understanding there is of what's going on in China. There are many SGeans who aren't even aware of human rights issues in our own country, much less China. We're also not used to paying attention to politics+power.
Jun 9, 2021 • 9 tweets • 4 min read
1/ Here's my quick translation of today's @zaobaosg editorial on racism in #Singapore.

tl;dr It attributes racist incidents to #Covid19 frustrations, social media, and Critical Race Theory, described as an imported idea encouraging racist hatred against white people. 2/ Here is the original, if you would prefer to read it in Chinese: Original: zaobao.com.sg/forum/editoria…

I don't read @zaobaosg often, but from what I've seen, this is in character for Singapore's Chinese language daily broadsheet.
Jun 3, 2021 • 9 tweets • 4 min read
1/ This @straits_times headline and graphic is so thoughtless and frames this issue in such a damaging way. Throughout the article, it's made clear that these transnational families are more financially disadvantaged than families where both parents are citizens, which leads to particular stressors and challenges. This is a class issue, not a nationality issue.
May 1, 2021 • 15 tweets • 6 min read
On the individual level, it's "nice" to see people donating to help others in need. The local media loves to highlight this; the angle is usually how Singaporeans are generous and caring and empathetic, really.

What's less examined is *why* we're crowdfunding in the first place. Donating is a nice thing as an individual, but as a society we should be asking if it's just that a delivery rider doesn't get work injury compensation/accident insurance 'cos we have a gig economy that leaves companies free of responsibilities for the workers who prop them up.
Apr 20, 2021 • 31 tweets • 12 min read
🧵on #Covid19 tech + surveillance in 🇸🇬

1/ Unlike this time last year, when Singapore's epidemic curve shot up and we were seeing new cases in the 100s/1000s (mostly within migrant worker dorms), the number of cases have come right down now, and tend to be mostly imported cases. Image 2/ Of course, this drop in cases + vaccination roll-out doesn't mean that we should get complacent and think that #Covid19 is over, because it isn't.

But what are we doing doubling down so hard on #Covid19 tech and surveillance?
Apr 16, 2021 • 11 tweets • 3 min read
While thinking further about @the_ayeminthant's piece, as well as looking at responses to my own piece on @splicenewsroom (thank you everyone!) I'm reminded of this experience that I had years ago... (here comes the 🧵) 1/ This was back in the day when I still thought that freelancing might only be a temporary arrangement for me. A well-established and respected Western, English language media company was hiring a Southeast Asia Correspondent, so I thought that I'd apply.