Amos Yee has been up to some truly appalling antics.

He was recently deplatformed after he was banned on Facebook and Twitter, and had his Patreon page disabled.

This was after content he was uploading was reported.

These included videos and Facebook posts that served to legitimise and legalise paedophilia.

One former Yee supporter, Melissa Chen, is the latest, and probably the most relevant advocate to speak out against Yee.

Refresh

If you don't know who Chen is, here's a refresher.

Basically, she's a human rights activist originally from Singapore, who played a huge part in securing Yee's political asylum in America.

Change in perspective

But for a while now, she has been strongly against Yee's choice of content and speech.

In perhaps the strongest statement yet, Chen made a nearly 10-minute video discussing her thoughts on Yee.

Here it is.

[video width="640" height="360" mp4="https://static.mothership.sg/1/2018/12/10000000_290446951583475_7702051996064561043_n.mp4"][/video]

Key points

If you don't have 10 minutes to spare, here are some of the key points she made.

She had handed Yee some documents that kickstarted the entire asylum process while he was still in jail in Singapore.

Yee had cut all ties with her since February 2017.

He had apparently done this as he felt she was being too authoritarian in her advice to him to ensure his success in gaining asylum in the US.

She rarely even thought about what he was up to, or kept up to date with him.

Now, she feels Yee has to be deported from America, because of his views on paedophilia.

"I am compelled to say Amos needs to be deported from the United States, and if he, in the process, gets sent back to jail in Singapore for going AWOL on National Service, I would find it extremely difficult to sympathise with that."

She also volunteered to escort him on his one-way ticket back.

While a free-speech advocate, she insists there are some ideas that are unacceptable:

"Some repulsive ideas generate too much negative externalities, and especially when these externalities involve the welfare of children, I think society cannot allow them to have free reign."

I am compelled to say Amos needs to be deported from the United States, and if he, in the process, gets sent back to jail in Singapore for going AWOL on National Service, I would find it extremely difficult to sympathise with that.

... he has betrayed basic human decency, he has betrayed innocent children everywhere, he has also betrayed the moral fabric of society.

She did acknowledge the irony of a free-speech warrior like her advocating for shutting down Yee's avenues for his free speech.

Chen explained how she feels responsible, due to her role in getting him asylum.

She reiterated her call to get Yee out of America, stating "being in America is a privilege, not a right".

Hindsight

Chen then gave a succinct summary of the entire Amos Yee fiasco in Singapore, as well as highlight some of the international media's glowing praise of Yee.

After summarising the timeline, Chen talked about the blindspots and biases some activists, including herself, might have suffered from:

"The obvious problem on hindsight is that the desire to see him as a figure, as some sort of figure, that could take the same shape of our own cause, admittedly led to developing blind spots and biases."

One of those biases being his much lauded intelligence.

"For example, I think his brilliance and genius have been vastly overstated."

She further stated that Yee was a narcissist and had "zero redeeming qualities".

Chen did reiterate her opposition to the measures taken against Yee in Singapore.

She also blamed those actions, and Singapore's general culture, on not nourishing his "neurodivergent idiosyncrasies".

Despite that, Chen also acknowledged Yee was no longer a child and had to be held accountable for his actions as an adult.

Chen said she was personally sorry for how this turned out, and how this might affect future activists in Singapore.

She also had this to say about Yee.

"Amos is a stain on Singapore, and a stain on the human race."

Why Amos Yee got no-platformed:

Image from Lester978’s WordPress

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