The week in free expression 19 September – 26 September
Bombarded with news from all angles every day, important stories can easily pass us by. To help you cut through the noise, every Friday Index publishes a weekly news roundup of some of the key stories covering censorship and free expression. This week, we look at the designation of Antifa as domestic terrorists and the indictment of James Comey.
Australian horror movie edited to make a gay couple straight
An Australian company behind the new horror film Together, pulled it from cinemas in China this week. This followed the discovery of unauthorised changes made by the Chinese distributor which had edited a scene from a gay wedding to make the couple appear heterosexual.
Together, starring James Franco and Alison Brie, is distributed by Neon who released a statement on the edits: “Neon does not approve of Hishow’s unauthorised edit of the film and have demanded they cease distributing this altered version.”
Guidelines released by China’s top media regulator in 2016 banned depictions of homosexuality from TV in the country. In the past, the ban would have meant sections of an offending movie or documentary would have been edited out as happened with the Freddie Mercury biopic Bohemian Rhapsody. However AI technology has allowed scenes to be altered instead.
In the case of Together an AI-generated woman replaced the man depicted in the original and so a gay wedding became a straight one.
Trump signs order designating Antifa a domestic terrorist organisation
US President Donald Trump signed an order on Monday designating Antifa a domestic terrorist organisation following the death of podcaster Charlie Kirk.
An article released by the White House refers to an alleged “trend of Radical Left violence that has permeated the nation in recent years” and provides a list of supposed “Antifa” attacks. This included the assertion that Kirk was “assassinated by a Radical Left terrorist” which many people dispute, as there is little proof the shooter had any political affiliation or that there was a greater conspiracy.
Antifa gets its name from compacting the term “anti-facist” and has its roots in 1920s and 1930s Europe, where groups formed to push back against growing fascist movements.
Concerns have been raised regarding the legality of such an order, or even how such an order should be carried out, with Antifa not really being an organisation at all in the USA, just a loosely connected network of protest groups. Seth G. Jones from the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) wrote in 2020 after Trump had suggested a similar move: “While President Trump raised the possibility of designating Antifa as a terrorist organization, such a move would be problematic. It would trigger serious First Amendment challenges and raise numerous questions about what criteria should be used to designate far-right, far-left, and other extremist groups in the United States. In addition, Antifa is not a “group” per se, but rather a decentralised network of individuals. Consequently, it is unlikely that designating Antifa as a terrorist organisation would even have much of an impact.”
BBC releases short film calling for Gaza access
A short film premiered on Wednesday and launched by the BBC, AFP, AP and Reuters called for international journalists to be allowed into Gaza.
Independent reporters have been refused entry to the strip since the 7 October attacks on Israel, leading to repeated calls for access from foreign press and governments.
In a statement Deborah Turness, CEO of BBC News, said: “As journalists, we record the first draft of history. But in this conflict, reporting is falling solely to a small number of Palestinian journalists, who are paying a terrible cost.
“It is almost two years since October 7th when the world witnessed Hamas’ atrocities. Since then, a war has been raging in Gaza but international journalists are not allowed in. We must now be let into Gaza. To work alongside local journalists, so we can all bring the facts to the world.”
You can watch the short film here.
Chinese Journalist Zhang Zhan jailed for “picking quarrels and provoking trouble”
Chinese lawyer and journalist Zhang Zhan has been sentenced to four years imprisonment for “picking quarrels and provoking trouble”.
Zhan was jailed in 2020 for reporting on the Covid-19 outbreak in Wuhan through her YouTube and Twitter (now X) accounts and is just one of many writers and journalists currently imprisoned in China.
Released in May 2024 she was arrested again by police three months later whilst travelling to report on the arrest of an activist in the province of Gansu.
Concerns are mounting over Zhan’s health after she has reportedly gone on repeated hunger strikes to protest her arrest.
Ex-FBI director James Comey indicted on two charges
Ex-director of the FBI James Comey has been indicted on two charges by a Virginia court this week.
Comey has been charged with one count of making false statements and one count of obstruction of justice according to the indictment.
Comey was appointed FBI director in 2013 by then President Barack Obama and served in this role until his firing in 2017 by President Donald Trump, during an investigation into links between the Trump campaign and Russia in the 2016 presidential election.
In 2020 Comey faced a congressional hearing where he defended the investigation, stating: “In the main, it was done by the book, it was appropriate and it was essential that it be done, there were parts of it that were concerning.”
It is at this hearing that Comey is accused of knowingly lying to congress whilst being questioned about the FBI’s handling of both the Russia investigation and an investigation into a private email server used by Hilary Clinton.
Comey’s trial is notably being held in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, known as the espionage court, and famously host to cases such as that of Edward Snowden, and CIA whistleblower John Kiriakou.
Haiti’s violence is so extreme, it’s difficult to face up to it. But we must.
Haiti has played on my mind for months, not least since reading a piece in the Miami Herald in June about people being beheaded in a church. That level of violence will always make one sit up but what really got to me were the perpetrators. It was not at the hands of the infamous gangs – it was at the hands of so-called self-defence brigades set up to fight the gangs. At the time of reading this I was surprised the story wasn’t more widely covered. I mostly put it down to one simple fact – a challenge we are all too familiar with – distraction by other world events. I’ve now done some digging and it’s more than that.
Today Haiti is facing an intense crisis, or “total chaos” as the UN has described it. They’re led by a coalition set up almost two years ago to offer stability after the former prime minister, Ariel Henry, was ousted. Except the coalition is deemed dysfunctional and useless. A network of gangs control swathes of the country, a main spokesman for the largest being the ominously named Jimmy “Barbecue” Chérizier (Barbecue is in fact simply a reference to his mother’s food stall). The gangs run many of the roads, a convenient way to tax people using them and grow rich in so doing. The country’s main airport, in the capital Port-au-Prince, is effectively closed after several planes were shot at. A patchwork of counter militia have emerged who rival the gangs in violence. Thousands have been killed, millions displaced, starvation is rife, as is rape.
Given the violence, alongside the logistical challenges of getting in and out of the country and travelling internally, international media have largely stayed away. This is a big frustration for Michael Deibert, an author, journalist and Index contributor, who is rare in actually still visiting (and will be writing more in-depth for Index on this). He has been reporting from Haiti for decades and was last there in July. While he recognised the extreme difficulties for foreign correspondents, he did nevertheless stress that they needed to be there. As an aside Deibert also told me that he regularly receives videos of gang atrocities.
Deibert’s point about the absence of foreign media is made all the more important because local journalists are struggling to report the story. They are terrified of both sides – the gangs and militia – and speaking to either in the interests of impartial journalism risks them being deemed a “collaborator”. Meanwhile even seemingly neutral areas to cover, like the reopening of a hospital, have led to the death of several of their own.
The violence isn’t just about silencing the messenger, it’s about the message: A viral video of someone being murdered, the ringing sounds of gunshots in the distance, a woman raped in the open – these make people incredibly cautious about speaking out lest they’re next. The UN might describe the scenes in Haiti as “total chaos” but they’re also ones motivated by total control.
Gen Z movement sparks political change in Nepal
On Monday 8 September I drove into Bouddha on the north eastern corner of Kathmandu from my home in Besigaun. It was just like any other day at this time of year with the streets crowded with cars and scooters and local buses stopping at every junction, their conductors with the doors swung open, shouting out their lists of destinations, cramming passengers into every available space for a 20 rupee bus ride into town. I was on my way to Yaks recording studio around lunchtime to continue work on an audio project and once settled into the soundproof room on the 5th floor of the building began my session reading from the script. Less than two hours into the recording I took off my headphones, surprised by the noises filtering through the walls and into the mic rendering the session useless. That’s not normal. I waited a few minutes, and then, rather than making a complaint to the management, I decided I had done enough for the day and packed up. As I left, I noticed the workstations in the design studio all vacant. Something is not right.
It wasn’t until I arrived home around 4pm that the news of the shooting and killing of Gen-Z protesters outside the parliament buildings became apparent. The shock of the tragedy was starting to reveal itself on social media. It was only then that I connected the commotion outside the recording studio with the protest taking place in other parts of the city and I began to realise the gravity of the situation. The videos of protesters in what appeared to be quite harmless situations being shot and killed by the Nepal Police was something I had never expected to see in Nepal, or anywhere else for that matter. It wasn’t until I woke the following morning to the angry sounds of demonstrators in our neighbourhood that I realised that the Nepal I had known as my second home for the last 13 years would never be the same again. I was overwhelmed with sadness for this country and its people who have bravely worked hard and suffered so long to lift themselves out of poverty despite the setbacks caused by natural disasters, economic hardship and political incompetence.
So what was it that brought Gen Z out onto the streets to protest that fateful Monday morning in September? On the Thursday before, the government announced that they were blocking 26 social media apps—ostensibly because those companies were not registered in Nepal, and until they registered and paid their dues, they would be banned from conducting their business in Nepal. That, in principle, seemed fair enough to me. Businesses should be registered, but why had the government waited more than 15 years to implement the ruling? This was not a step-by-step plan which would have caused mild irritation to most Nepalis. It was a serious threat to millions who depend on social media as vital sales channels through which they conduct their small businesses. A blanket ban, instantly executed, wreaked instant economic hardship on a significant proportion of the entrepreneurial sector of the population and sent them into panic mode overnight. Added to that, the younger generation understands the value of social media as their main avenue of expression through which they can express their grievances and frustrations with the current situation in Nepal. The older generation in government positions were largely ignorant of the importance of social media to the younger generation and dismissed them out of hand. They misjudged the situation and ignored the signals coming from the young to their peril. By Tuesday morning the ban on social media had been lifted, but the damage had already been done.
To understand better just how dependent Nepalis are on social media, one should be aware that Nepal’s economy depends to a large extent on remittances from family members working abroad—mostly in the Middle East, Japan, Korea and Malaysia. These families, split families, through no fault of their own, are torn apart because of a lack of well paid jobs in their own country. They rely heavily on social media to keep connected—to keep the fragile thread of family alive—and to dream of a life where they can live in the same house as their loved ones, instead of decades in forced exile just to survive. The children of these migrant workers are using the savings of their parents and leaving the country by the million every year to study abroad and take jobs in a variety of professions in the developed world, with never the intention to return. Nepal is haemorrhaging its young blood faster than it can ever replace it and the cost to the nation is literally a question of life or death.
This blocking of social media was the spark that ignited the flame of discontent that motivated Gen Z to get out on the streets of Kathmandu and protest their dissatisfaction to the government. But the protest was not about the blocking of social media – that was the straw that broke the camel’s back. The protest was about the rampant corruption in government, cronyism and nepotism and lack of transparency in a government hopelessly entrenched in its ways—turning a blind eye to the chronic needs of its people. The evidence of corruption became even more apparent when the social media profiles of the grown-up children of members of the government and other political parties showed them living in lavish apartments around the world, having expensive holidays and sporting Rolex watches and Gucci handbags and driving cars worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, while their fathers were apparently only earning a measly 400 USD a month in Nepal.
So where did all that money come from to furnish these people with such lavish lifestyles? To my mind you don’t have to look further than the half-completed infrastructure projects littering the countryside. Projects lying unfinished for five years or more – disintegrating before my eyes, washed away by a monsoon of diverted funds. But what do I really know about the inner workings of the governing of this country? Very little. I don’t have the evidence. I just see unfinished projects everywhere and a population whose patience has run out. Add to that the pictures allegedly showing the children of government officials living lifestyles abroad well beyond the reach of many middle class Europeans and you have a powder keg of emotional dynamite ready to blow up the Houses of Parliament. That is what happened.
On the day after the Gen Z protest, the public took to the streets in anger and frustration at the government’s lack of empathy for the loss of life of their children. There were no apologies—no statements of regret. No taking responsibility for this act of aggression. For every child murdered by the Nepal Police there were thousands who came out into the streets. What followed became one of the blackest days in Nepal’s history—a day of utter devastation with historic government buildings, hotels, police stations and businesses set on fire and routes for fire engines blocked by the mobs to prevent any access to the properties by the emergency services. Ministers were tracked down and subjected to mob violence, their houses ransacked and burned to the ground—the stashes of their ill-gotten wealth reduced to flames, floating into the smoke-filled sky.
This morning I ventured out into a city reeling from the shock of the events of the previous three days. With no interim government yet established, the army has taken control of the city, imposing a curfew with twice daily access to shops and essential services amounting to five daylight hours split between early morning and late afternoon. I set off with my camera and international press card to take a few shots of what I had only witnessed on social media. It was a heartbreaking reconnaissance. The streets were littered with burned out carcasses of cars and trucks. The local police headquarters was a blackened skeleton of brick and concrete. The army stopped me the second I parked my scooter outside the burned-out shell of the local superstore, ignored my press card and told me in no uncertain terms to leave the area immediately. I left.
But the feeling on the street was not one of fear or trepidation. People were going about their business shopping at the small local stalls and supermarkets with only the slightest sense of anxiety to get home before the 10am curfew. Electricians were busy repairing cables damaged by the rioting and local groups were clearing the streets of the flotsam and jetsam of the days before. On social media there was progress being made by representatives of the Gen Z generation–the young hopefuls on whose shoulders the future of Nepal now rests. And they have a strong contender to take responsibility for an interim cabinet who has the advantage of age and experience to guide them. Former Chief Justice of Nepal Sushila Karki is perceived by most of my close friends as good news for the country. She is smart, honest, and a woman with a commendable track record. And she knows the law. There is a lot of work to be done to undo the decades of corruption and poor governance, but I get the feeling that the will of the Nepalese is strong enough to endure the years it will take to achieve a more fair and balanced society that will turn this tragedy into a solid and lasting period of prosperity not only for Gen Z but for future generations to come.
—
Index asked Gary to speak to Nepalis about their hopes and fears following the violence of the last few days.
The author and translator Viplob Pratik said, “I have a clear understanding of the Gen Z movement, and I deeply admire their courage. This movement did not emerge overnight; it took shape after a long period of simmering dissatisfaction and suffocation among the youth regarding the government system of Nepal. Consequently, this Gen Z resistance is a reaction to prolonged repression — thoughts and emotions subdued by a ruling party that has consistently neglected the desires, needs, and interests of young people. The government’s tendency to take the youth’s voice for granted, to ignore them, and to underestimate their capacity for mature decision-making, played a significant role in igniting the current situation. As a result, Nepal witnessed the pivotal events of 8 September 2025.”
He added, “We do not need to teach Gen Z; they know what they are doing. However, now that the initial wave of the movement has calmed and it is evolving, I am disheartened to see various entities—whether from the old political parties, insiders, or outsiders—trying to capitalise on the moment. They are essentially attempting to exploit the loopholes for their own gain. Witnessing such a scenario fills me with profound concern. I strongly believe that if the outcome of this movement is not guided onto the right path by fair and deserving hands, it will be a tragedy that history will mourn.”
Rajan Ghimire, a humanitarian, development and rights activist, recounted his own thoughts on the past three days.
“Day 1: The morning began with optimism, but by the afternoon I felt deep anger at the government’s brutal response toward the youth.
Day 2: I started the day still angry, but by midday that anger gave way to fear. In the evening I felt a growing sense of hopelessness. Near my home, there is a gas station with a garage attached. After hearing that people had set fire to Bhatbhateni in Koteshwor, I was alarmed to learn that someone set a vehicle on fire in the garage near the gas station. We feared the gas station might explode. Thankfully, the fire was contained, but none of us could sleep that night.
Day 3: The day passed under a cloud of uncertainty, not knowing what would happen next.”
He added, “Thankfully no major infrastructure damage was reported but we lost human lives. It feels as if our country has been pushed back by years, even decades. I hold on to hope that we can rise from the ashes and rebuild but I remain confused about how.”
Suraj Ghimire said, “Right now, leaders from different parties are trying to break the unity of the protesters, taking advantage of divisions and pushing their own agendas online. They think this will help them regain power, but the people have spoken, the ones that were out on the streets don’t want them back. What they want is simple and clear: the president’s resignation and the dissolution of the current parliament.”
Medical student Nabin Poudel said, “The ongoing Gen Z movement is undeniably legitimate, embodying years of accumulated frustration over systemic corruption and decades of ineffective leadership. Yet, the prolonged indecision regarding the dissolution of the lower house and the formation of an interim government threatens to deepen political instability rather than resolve it.”
The winter 2025 edition of Index on Censorship magazine will look at both the silencing of Gen Z around the world and how influencers like Charlie Kirk, who was murdered in September, became important voices for this demographic.