#uyghur — Public Fediverse posts

Reading books can get you killed

Reading a Uyghur book can lead to serious punishment

August 2026

This is not the Middle Ages. This is the 21st Century. But the desire of the Chinese to extinguish Uyghur culture can lead to draconian consequences. This short piece and the book, were created by the Amnesty Death Penalty project.

So often, we take our books for granted.      But if you are Uyghur, reading, promoting or writing books in the Uyghur language – even children’s text books – can land you in serious trouble.      In fact it can and has on a number of occasions, resulted in a death sentence.    This is all part of the Chinese government’s attempts to suppress the Uyghur language, culture and identity.      Too many governments around the world use the death penalty as a means of intimidating ordinary people into compliance.  Books, things that we take for granted in the West, can be very dangerous for Uyghurs which is why the Anti-Death Penalty Project has created a book (كىتاب) to show our solidarity. ‘Thank you so much Death Penalty Network for such a beautiful and thoughtful project!  

The Salisbury group publishes a report each month on the use of the penalty around the world. It does not include China as executions are a state secret. The country is believed to execute more of its citizens than the rest of the world put together.

The #YouTube video of #ProtestSong “East Turkistan,” voiced by a #Texan who backed up Whitney Houston, describes a “torture that never ends” for the #Turkic #Muslim #Uyghur people of northwestern #China , and asks listeners, “When will the world hear?”

Singer Della Miles worked with composer Turgay Evren, a popular #Turkish poet, on the musical #denunciation of Beijing’s #persecution of the Uyghurs.

https://thechinaproject.com/2023/07/27/american-soul-singer-and-turkish-poet-release-song-to-protest-uyghur-suffering/amp

#ActivistMusic #AsianMastodon #HumanRights #MusicForActivism #POC

#introduction: I'm a storyteller practicing the art of #oralstorytelling

I tell #folktales #myths #legends #FairyTales primarily to live audiences. Currently building a repertoire of traditional tales from the #Uyghur oral tradition.

Also interested in: #theatre #AudioDrama #SocialAudio #baking #movies and using #Instagram for #ConceptualArt

Mastodon seems to encourage puns, absurdist mini-plays, and hilarious intentional misreadings of everything and I am here for it.