Hong Kong:

A radio present selling LGBTQ equality will finish its 17-year run at Hong Kong’s public broadcaster on Sunday, with station administration citing “adjustments in programme” as the rationale for cancellation.

The axing of “We Are Household” comes after Beijing crushed Hong Kong’s democracy motion and imposed a sweeping nationwide safety legislation in 2020, which critics say has fractured civil society and silenced dissent.

Programme co-host Brian Leung mentioned he was “mentally ready” for the present to be dropped on the government-funded Radio Tv Hong Kong (RTHK), however was not given a passable clarification when assembly with station administration earlier this month.

“For a conventional platform like RTHK, this programme was kind of strolling a tightrope,” Leung Informed Afp in an interview hours earlier than the ultimate present.

That includes a mixture of chitchat, information and visitor interviews, the present was a uncommon platform that advocated homosexual rights within the Chinese language metropolis and its 2006 debut broke the mould on the public broadcaster.

Partly impressed by the success of the Oscar-winning movie “Brokeback Mountain”, the present in its early days loved editorial freedom “to an extent I discovered virtually laborious to consider”, Leung recalled.

The present, which aired for 2 hours each Sunday at midnight, made use of the broadcaster’s vast attain to current LGBTQ content material as “one thing enjoyable, light-hearted and fascinating”, Leung mentioned.

An episode about the highschool bullying of LGBTQ teenagers gained a Human Rights Press Award in 2010, whereas different episodes sparked dialogue on subjects resembling drag tradition and discrimination confronted by transgender folks.

“With the ability to host this kind of programme at a public broadcaster is itself a press release,” Leung mentioned.

“If we will speak about homosexuality, sexual orientation on RTHK each week, meaning… it isn’t taboo.”

‘We are able to change minds’

Louis Lee, 28, informed AFP that he began listening to the present round a decade in the past, simply as he was popping out and dabbling in activism.

“What impressed me most was that I heard my mom tuning in to ‘We Are Household’. There have been additionally taxi and minibus drivers who listened to the programme and I may have chats with them,” Lee mentioned.

A 67-year-old retiree who gave her identify as Could informed AFP that she discovered the present informative and referred to as it a “rarity” in Hong Kong.

“It seems like town is being remoulded into a spot the place we will solely have what the authorities enable and variety is not tolerated,” she mentioned.

RTHK informed AFP that it evaluations its programming methods every so often and doesn’t touch upon inner editorial issues.

Hong Kong has seen a gradual rise in help for same-sex marriage, particularly amongst youthful residents.

A survey this yr discovered that 60 per cent of Hong Kongers supported same-sex marriage, in comparison with simply 38 per cent a decade in the past.

However the metropolis’s Beijing-approved management has proven little urge for food in passing legal guidelines that advance LGBTQ equality.

Most not too long ago, Hong Kong’s high court docket is processing a problem in opposition to town’s restrictive marriage legal guidelines introduced by activist Jimmy Sham, who’s amongst a bunch of opposition figures on trial for subversion.

RTHK in 2020 axed a preferred satirical TV present after complaints a couple of skit lampooning the police and the station later noticed a administration shakeup.

Regardless of the shortage of change within the metropolis’s governing establishments, Leung mentioned he hoped the present “expanded the area for dialogue” whilst LGBTQ rights advocates confronted a “harsh winter” forward.

“We can not change the established order however we will change minds,” he mentioned.

(Apart from the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV employees and is revealed from a syndicated feed.)