Here’s the video of the press conference held yesterday by the peeps behind Sex.Violence.FamilyValues. You can read about it here, where they insist the movie is not racist and that they will be appealing against the decision by the Media Development Authority. Here’s another video on director Ken Kwek’s thoughts. His official statement can be read here. There’s also an online petition going around to reinstate the film, which you can find here. I haven’t gotten around to mentioning it until now, but some of you may have noticed rather similar issues—although on a smaller scale—floating around online. There’s that bit about choreographer Daniel Kok’s request for a grant for his piece The Gay Romeo turned down, presumably because of its theme and content. Even though it’s a travel grant to Japan and not for a presentation in Singapore. Thought this was quite interesting in that the defense for not supporting such works has usually been because of the perceived conservatism of the Singapore community that supposedly aren’t ready for such pieces. But if it’s to support a piece for a different audience? There was also that bit about a work by visual artist Heman Chong at Goodman Arts Centre taken down after receiving complaints. The vinyl decal piece with the statement “I don’t give a fuck about public opinion” was the first installment of a series called Landing Space, which features works by artists at, erm, a landing space at Goodman Arts Centre. It was set up on Sept 24, 5pm, and after complaints, taken immediately down the following day at 11am. It was at a place where you’d think people would be a bit more tolerant and have a sense of humour. Food for thought.