‘We will go to war’: why #SEAblings became a Southeast Asian rallying cry

#SEAblings – short for “Southeast Asian siblings” – has increasingly been used by young Southeast Asians to signal regional solidarity, be it over a controversial concert or a political event. Whether such moments are fleeting or have the potential to morph into a sustainable movement is a subject of debate.

For some sociologists, the question is not whether the quarrel mattered, but what the response of young Southeast Asians suggests about how they see themselves.

Iim Halimatusa’diyah, a visiting senior fellow at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute’s regional social and cultural studies programme, described #SEAblings as “an articulation of a growing regional identity” among this generation.

The hashtag gained traction recently after footage circulated appearing to show a person supposedly associated with a Korean fansite using professional camera equipment at the South Korean rock band Day6’s show in Kuala Lumpur on January 31, despite rules prohibiting such devices.