The day before his term ends, Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte's government ordered the closure of investigative website, Rappler. The site was founded by Filipino journalist and Nobel Peace Prize winner Maria Ressa, a critical player in exposing former-president Rodrigo Duterte’s human rights abuses during the drug war. Rappler’s reporting has been on government members and Duterte’s inner circle’s radar - the company has been banned from attending presidential events since 2018. “When you give up your rights, you never get it back” says Marina Ressa when the Philippine gov’t ordered the investigative website Rappler to shut down. Rappler’s staff are on high alert, as the country moves from a Duarte to a Marcos presidency. Rappler’s impact goes beyond its own interests, independent news sites will take cues from Rappler as to how to safeguard freedom of expression in the Philippines.

Asians make up 16% of Australia’s population, but the parliament does not reflect that. In the previous term, only three were occupied by MPs of Asian background: Gladys Liu in Melbourne’s Chisholm, Ian Goodenough in Perth’s Moore and Dave Sharma in Sydney’s Wentworth. Last week, six Asian candidates have claimed victory: independent Dai Le in Sydney’s Fowler; and Labor candidates Sam Lim in Perth’s Tangney, Michelle Ananda-Rajah in Melbourne’s Higgins, Zaneta Mascarenhas in Perth’s Swan, Sally Sitou in Sydney’s Reid and Cassandra Fernando in Melbourne’s Holt. While the parliament doubled their Asian parliament members, 96% of federal lawmakers are still white. Could this be a turning point?

What is Ultra Fast Fashion? It’s a quicker, more exploitive way of making clothes that’s trending right now. Especially on #TikTok. Not only is it destroying the planet, but for Asian women, this method of making clothes to meet Western demand has been called modern day colonialism. Approximately 80% of garment workers are women, mostly 18-24 year olds, from countries like India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Myanmar, and Cambodia. The only reason clothes can be this cheap to the Western consumer, who buys sometimes thousands of dollars worth of apparel at a time, is because in Asia someone isn’t making a living wage. One of many needed reforms is for Western countries with spending power to buy less, and for policies to create safer and equitable working conditions for garment workers. We should think about how we feel about our contribution to this culture when we look back on this era of ultra fast fashion? Will we be proud of the massive consumption?

Marina Fujiwara (@mudazukuri) makes useless things. The plot twist? She’s a professional inventor. She doesn’t see this as a waste of time or money–on the contrary, she believes this is how you convert failure to success. . Her 無駄づくり, a practice in inventing useless products, juxtaposes a world that builds systems and things to be more efficient. “We focus too much on efficiency and functionality and by not observing the opposite we tend to overlook and leave ideas on the table,” says Marina.

10,905 reports of Asian hate incidents were reported from March 2020 to Dec 2021. That’s a 361% increase from the year before. And because of language barriers and unfamiliarity with complex legal systems, the actual number of attacks is likely far greater. STOPH8 is an SMS chatbot that tracks the reporting of hate incidents. Users can send and receive text messages via mobile devices by texting (786748) which spells STOPHATE to receive immediate assistance. Like a textable '911'. Using this process, reporting hate crimes will be as familiar and accessible as sending a text. The more we can capture the reports, the more we can seek justice for victims, and the more policy and resources can be distributed to the community that need it most. Text 786748 (STOPH8) to Report Asian Hate Crimes See www.reporthate.info for more info

TW: Sexual Violence In April, the Indonesian government banned “Virginity Testing” in the military employment processes. For decades, those identifying as women have been telling employers that “Virginity Testing” is ‘discriminatory, invasive, abusive, and has no bearing on their professional performances.’ It’s also totally unscientific. The test involves someone placing their fingers into a cadet's vagina to supposedly assess whether they have had sex. It’s a form of gender-based sexual violence and the @WHO World Health Organization states that “there is no place for virginity (or ‘two-finger’) testing; it has no scientific validity.” Human Rights Watch exposed the use of these tests by Indonesian forces in 2014. In 2015, the armed forces Information Chief Major Gen Fuad Basya, told the BBC that it's a matter of national security,"If it is not restricted this way, then someone with a bad habit will become military personnel. Soldiers are a nation's defenders. They defend a nation's sovereignty, a country's territory and security." In 2018 the WHO reported that the practice is recorded in many places besides Indonesia, including Afghanistan, Brazil, Egypt, India, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Palestine, Sri Lanka, and Turkey.