Just a few days ago, actress Liu Yifei who plays the titular character in Mulan, was under the spotlight for all the wrong reasons. Her twitter comments supporting the police forces in Hong Kong at a time when people in Hong Kong were protesting for democracy and the new policies would allow these protesters to be extradited to China to face their ‘crimes’, have been facing backlash with the hashtag #BoycottMulan. And now Disney themselves are facing the latest brunt of #BoycottMulan for their credits section in the movie.
Disney thanked the government entities of China’s province of Xinjiang in the end credits sequence of Mulan. The film was shot in around 20 locations in China including the Mingsha Shan desert, which stretches into Xinjiang, and the Tuyuk Valley, to the east of Turpan. But the province of Xinjiang is infamous for another ‘venture’ – the dozens or so ‘re-education camps’ which are holding over a million or so Uighur Muslims in detention.
The Uighur residents are reported to be facing grueling political propaganda regiments while enduring forced labour and sterilization – to suppress the birth rate of the Muslim community. According to China, these detention camps are part of a peaceful effort to improve the security and economic development in the region.
Social and human rights activists have been trying for years to get UN (human rights) officials to properly scrutinize the detention camps, which were vehemently refused by the Chinese Government. When big companies like Disney ignore the human rights violation and police brutality happening literally a few hours from where they are shooting their 200 million dollar movie, they are potentially complicit to the mass incarceration of the Uyghur Muslims says Hong Kong pro-democracy advocate Joshua Wong.
With the hashtag #BoycottMulan trending in Hong Kong and US heavily, there has been a call to the rest of the world, to boycott the film in its entirety . Many will argue that boycotting the film will not solve the problems happening in the Chinese province or Hong Kong. And it most likely is true, but the mass boycotting will definitely get noticed if the trend turns to reality.
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