Vietnam: Artistic Freedom Report 2023 – 2024

While the netizens’ uncompromising stance against China’s territorial claims is understandable—partly because it is a shared and ongoing concern among several countries in the region—the hostility toward the historical Republic of Vietnam and its symbols as a performative display of nationalist pride and patriotism at times seems to have  gone out of hand. On 3 November 2024, a Facebook page named Bồ Hồ Hill, which had 31,000 followers, posted a series of photos showing young visitors posing with middle fingers raised or arms crossed in an X in front of the Republic of Vietnam’s flag—an artefact displayed at the newly opened Vietnam Military History Museum in Hanoi. The post was captioned “‘500 shades’ of the youth when visiting the Vietnam Military History Museum,” and quickly went viral, sparking controversy. That same day, the museum announced its temporary closure from 3 to 5 November, citing “communication work for the 80th anniversary of the Vietnamese army.” On 7 November, a Facebook user named Hồng Thái Hoàng posted about her visit to the museum, noting that the flag was no longer displayed as before and had instead been folded. It is unclear whether the sudden temporary closure was a pure coincidence or a response towards the online social media campaign toward one of the museum’s artefacts, or both. What is certain, however, is that under the banner of patriotism, a significant portion of tech-savvy Vietnamese youth has embraced a form of extreme nationalism fuelled by the impulsiveness of cancel culture. They actively police dissenting thoughts on politics, historical narratives, and moral values online, where even minor deviations from the singular, state-aligned truth are swiftly met with public shaming. This pattern signals a troubling trajectory for freedom of expression in Vietnam, where ideological conformity is increasingly enforced not only by the state but also by its well-informed citizens.

Data from 2023 and 2024 continues to reiterate several points raised in the 2010-2022 report. While many challenges of freedom for artistic expression stemmed from rather ‘straightforward’ reasons, such as ideology, geopolitical concerns, there remain grey areas that frequently catch creators off-guard. Despite being considered a relatively queer-friendly country, where celebrities are widely accepted for expressing their queerness in both daily life as well as in professional settings, a recent incident raised questions about the extent to which queerness is truly accepted in Vietnam. On 7 October 2023, just ten minutes before their scheduled performance, a group of drag performers were informed by the organisers of ‘Rap Viet All Stars Concert’ that their appearance in ‘Như hình với bóng’, a duet between Pháp Kiều and rapper Suboi, had been cancelled, reportedly at the request of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Culture and Sport — the regulating body that had approved the event’s license earlier. Although there was no official statement from either the organiser or the Department—and despite the fact that the performance had aired on national broadcaster HTV2 just a month earlier—one drag performer disclosed that the organisers were told not to “support the LGBT community so publicly.” If this is the case, it suggests that while the Vietnamese government might appear lenient in certain areas like issues of gender and sexuality, such freedom also operates within shifting boundaries — or an arrested autonomy.