An Indonesian TikToker has been sentenced to almost three years in prison after reportedly ‘talking’ to a picture of Jesus on her phone and telling him to get a haircut. 
Ratu Thalisa, a Muslim transgender woman with more than 442,000 TikTok followers, had been on a livestream, and was responding to a comment that told her to cut her hair to look more like a man.
On Monday, a court in Medan, Sumatra found Thalisa guilty of spreading hatred under a controversial online hate-speech law, and sentenced her to two years and 10 months in jail.
The court said her comments could disrupt “public order” and “religious harmony” in society, and charged her with committing blasphemy.
The court ruling came after multiple Christian groups filed police complaints against Ms Thalisa for blasphemy.
The sentence has been condemned by human rights groups, including Amnesty International, who described it as “a shocking attack on Ratu Thalisa’s freedom of expression” and called for it to be quashed.
“The Indonesian authorities should not use the country’s Electronic Information and Transactions (EIT) law to punish people for comments made on social media,” Amnesty International Indonesia’s Executive Director Usman Hamid said in a statement.
“While Indonesia should prohibit the advocacy of religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence, Ratu Thalisa’s speech act does not reach that threshold.”
Mr Hamid called on Indonesian authorities to overturn Ms Thalisa’s conviction and ensure her immediate release from custody.
He also urged them to repeal or make substantial revisions to what he described as
“problematic provisions” in the EIT Law – namely, those criminalising alleged immorality, defamation and hate speech.
