On April 8th, VICE News published an article by writer Eliza McPhail about the work of Matt Loughrey, a “self-taught artist” in Ireland. The writer celebrated Loughrey's distortion of ID photos of Cambodian genocide victims from the infamous Khmer Rouge S-21 prison, suggesting that his work “colourised, humanised that tragedy.” He did no such thing.
The Southeast Asian Freedom Network (SEAFN) is outraged by VICE News and their decision to publish this article. [1] We call out VICE News and their history of amplifying trauma porn from Cambodia. We call out Matt Loughrey on his white saviour complex. We demand responsibility and accountability.
Loughrey whitewashed their Khmer features, erased the haunted images of terror, fear, and pain, and instead added smiles onto their faces. Loughrey did this without consent from family members or authorization from the Tuol Sleng Museum, where the photos are housed. On April 11th, 2021, the Cambodian Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts “considers this work of Matt Loughrey to seriously affect the dignity of the victims, the reality of Cambodia’s history, and in violation of the right of the Museum as the lawful owners and custodians of these photographs.”
On the the eve of Cambodian New Year and Genocide Remembrance Day, this article has distorted the truth and re-traumatized the Cambodian diaspora worldwide. This incident followed the deportation of 33 Vietnamese people on March 15th; the murder of 6 Asian women in Atlanta on March 17th; the femicide of 3 Hmong women and 1 Cambodian woman in that same week; and the resulting flood of attention on anti-Asian hate that magnifies interpersonal violence to the disservice of sytemic violence. These are all symptoms of white supremacy and we’ve had enough.
“Remembering is a source of power for genocide suriviors and refugees like us. VICE News and Loughrey took away that power by stripping away our ancestors' dignity and giving us caricatures. What they saw as a profound art project, we saw our people’s pain reduced to light skin and fake smiles for white gaze. We are more than this. We are resilient, powerful people and we refuse to allow VICE News, McPhail, Loughrey, or anyone else to profit off our pain”, says Sarath S. Suong, SEAFN National Director.
This all too familiar form of historical erasure for personal profit is cruel and inhumane, especially without the consent of impacted community.
These are our demands for VICE News, Loughrey, and McPhail:
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Matt Loughrey must immediately stop this project, discontinue all plans to exhibit them, and remove all images from digital media.
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Matt Loughrey and his business must give all proceeds and profits made from the photos to historical preservation efforts in Cambodia like the Tuol Sleng Museum, the Document Center of Cambodia, and the Bophana Center.
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VICE News must not only take down the article, but issue an apology to the public and to the Cambodian people.
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VICE News must work with community organizations to publish a series of articles and videos about issues directly impacting our communities - such as Southeast Asian deportations and detentions, all the ways our communities are building community and power in our healing, and more.
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We request a meeting with the editors of VICE to address more of our concerns.
Sign on to this petition to demand VICE News, Loughrey and McPhail end their anti-Asian violence now.
“No one gets to tell us we are human. We were human before you waged war on our countries. We don’t need white supremacy to humanize us, we need them to hold their governments accountable for their atrocities in Southeast Asia and many other countries around the world. We continue to be displaced, we continue to be separated by deportation. They don’t get to kill us and then re-traumatize us over and over again. This is anti Asian violence and it is cruel. And this stops now.” – Chhaya Chhoum, SEAFN co-founder and Mekong NYC director.
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