Shrina Patel
Mulan, a popular animated disney movie just became a live action film on Disney’s new streaming network, Disney Plus. Many people are thrilled to watch a movie that shows chinese culture authentically; others, however, are choosing to boycott it.
About a year before the movie’s debut, Liu Yifei, the chinese american lead actress, chose to publicly support repressive police in Hong Kong by reposting a Communist Party newspaper post on Weibo, a popular chinese social media platform. She reposted with the caption, “I also support Hong Kong police. You can beat me up now. What a shame for Hong Kong.” Yifei’s support came at a time when China was in the process of issuing a law to extradite suspected Hong Kong criminals to China. This scared activists and journalists among others. Fortunately, this law has been suspended, but Yifei’s show of support has been a controversial topic to many.
Now, the movie is facing more backlash due to Disney’s film credits giving thanks to several Chinese Communist Party propaganda departments in Xinjiang, China. These communist parties are currently holding millions of Uyghur people in concentration camps for their islamic beliefs in the hopes that they will change them.
This news infuriated fans who were excited to watch another animated disney princess movie come to life. Since the movie’s release, many are choosing to protest the relationships that were presented during the production of the movie by not watching it. This has resulted in $100 million worth of revenue being lost. Ex- fans chose to take these actions to spread the message that the support of police brutality and concentration camps should not be normalized and must be stopped.
