Viewpoint
10.03.22Thanks to a County in Utah, Same-Sex Couples Can Get Married—In China
When Juying attended her son Yangming’s wedding this summer, she was not in a banquet hall or a church but in her apartment. On Zoom, she watched Yangming—3,000 kilometers away in the southern metropolis of Guangzhou—stand next to his husband-to-be...
Reports
01.12.21Precarious Progress
Darius Longarino
OutRight Action International
Whether state decisionmakers in the coming years and decades will pursue policies to protect the equal rights for LGBT people will come down to a mix of ideology, pragmatism, and public pressure. LGBT advocates are striving to turn that calculus in...
Viewpoint
09.17.20Could Same-Sex Marriage Advocacy in China Be Poised for a Breakthrough?
Last fall, as China’s lawmakers neared finalizing the country’s first-ever Civil Code, they opened to public comment its draft chapters on marriage and other areas of law. A newly formed coalition of LGBTQ organizations advocating for gay marriage...
Viewpoint
10.18.19Converting the Converters
Chinese LGBT advocates have set out to convince China’s mental health field that being professionally competent means being LGBT-affirming (and for the already LGBT-friendly counselors, that mere friendliness is not enough—they also need to have...
ChinaFile Recommends
05.14.18China: Security Guards Assault Women Attending LGBT Event
Guardian
Women wearing rainbow badges were blocked from entering Beijing’s 798 arts district by guards who punched them and then knocked them to the ground.
Conversation
04.18.18A Ban on Gay Content, Stopped in Its Tracks
On April 13, China’s major microblogging platform Sina Weibo announced that, in order to create “a sunny and harmonious” environment, it would remove videos and comics “with pornographic implications, promoting bloody violence, or related to...
Depth of Field
11.20.17Fake Girlfriends, Chengdu Rappers, and a Chow Chow Making Bank
from Yuanjin Photo
Lonely dog owners in Beijing and a rented girlfriend in Fujian; the last Oroqen hunters in Heilongjiang and homegrown hip hop in Chengdu; young Chinese in an Indian tech hub and Hong Kong apartments only slightly larger than coffins—these are some...
ChinaFile Recommends
11.15.17“Have You Considered Your Parents’ Happiness?”
Human Rights Watch
The psychiatrist told my mom: ‘Homosexuality is just like all the other mental diseases, like depression, anxiety, or bipolar. It can be cured…. Trust me, leave him here, he is in good hands.’
The NYRB China Archive
10.26.17Sexual Life in Modern China
from New York Review of Books
Throughout the late 1970s and 1980s, Chinese writers grappled with the traumas of the Mao period, seeking to make sense of their suffering. As in the imperial era, most had been servants of the state, loyalists who might criticize but never seek to...
Caixin Media
07.07.17Court Rules Hospital Violated Gay Man’s Liberty
A gay man in Henan province has been awarded 5,000 yuan (U.S.$735) in compensation from a local psychiatric hospital where he was locked up for 19 days and forced to take pills and injections as therapy for his homosexuality. In its decision on June...
ChinaFile Recommends
05.25.17Anti-Gay Faith-Based Groups in Taiwan Vow to Take Fight against Same-Sex Marriage to next Level
Shanghaiist
On Wednesday afternoon, cheers rang out in the streets of Taipei as Taiwan’s top constitutional court ruled in favor of same-sex marriage, but not everyone present was so overjoyed. The ruling has left anti-gay groups on the island in shock, with...
ChinaFile Recommends
05.24.17‘Taiwan Says Yes!’: In Historic Decision, Top Court Rules in Favor of Same-Sex Marriage
Washington Post
A Taipei court on Wednesday ruled in favor of allowing same-sex marriage, paving the way for Taiwan to become the first nation in Asia to legalize same-sex unions and cementing its status as a beacon for LGBT rights.
Features
12.15.16‘Caught in Quicksand’: Gay and HIV-Positive in China
China is a country with giant cities, huge skyscrapers, and the world’s second largest economy. But underneath its modern looking facade, the country is still very traditional; this is especially true of attitudes toward homosexuality.China’s...
ChinaFile Recommends
06.14.16190 Chinese LGBT Groups Condemn Orlando Club Shooting
Global Times
China’s activists join the global fight for equality....
ChinaFile Recommends
06.14.16This Man Was Sectioned For Being Gay. Now He’s Fighting Back
Time
Man files suit for homophobic maltreatment within a mental institution....
Books
05.18.16Queer Marxism in Two Chinas
In Queer Marxism in Two Chinas, Petrus Liu rethinks the relationship between Marxism and queer cultures in mainland China and Taiwan. Whereas many scholars assume the emergence of queer cultures in China signals the end of Marxism and demonstrates China’s political and economic evolution, Liu finds the opposite to be true. He challenges the persistence of Cold War formulations of Marxism that position it as intellectually incompatible with queer theory, and shows how queer Marxism offers a nonliberal alternative to Western models of queer emancipation. The work of queer Chinese artists and intellectuals not only provides an alternative to liberal ideologies of inclusion and diversity, but demonstrates how different conceptions of and attitudes toward queerness in China and Taiwan stem from geopolitical tensions. With Queer Marxism in Two Chinas Liu offers a revision to current understandings of what queer theory is, does, and can be. —Duke University Press{chop}
Depth of Field
04.29.16April’s Best Chinese Photojournalism
from Yuanjin Photo
Over the past few weeks, the publications Sina, Tencent, Caixin, China Youth Daily, and the publishing duo Sixth Tone/The Paper published photo stories on the intimate, the industrial, the private, and the political. Journalists Yan Cong and Ye Ming...
ChinaFile Recommends
04.13.16Judge in China Rules Gay Couple Cannot Marry
New York Times
It was ruled on Wednesday, and it was China’s first court case addressing the issue of same-sex unions.
ChinaFile Recommends
11.30.15The Sham Marriage App Helping China’s Gay Community
Telegraph
With homosexuality illegal until 1997 and prejudice still rife, gays and lesbians are increasingly joining forces with the help of matchmaking apps
ChinaFile Recommends
11.24.15Chinese Student Protesting Books’ Stance on Homosexuality Meets With Officials
New York Times
Gay activists in China brought their demands for public acceptance to a court.
ChinaFile Recommends
10.26.15Not Enough Women in China? Let Men Share a Wife, an Economist Suggests
New York Times
“No one is forcing anyone to accept ‘one wife, many husbands!’ ”
ChinaFile Recommends
10.08.15Chinese Hospitals Still Offering Gay 'Cure' Therapy, Film Reveals
Guardian
Channel 4’s Unreported World finds doctors prescribing drugs and electric shocks to gay men and lesbians despite Beijing legalising homosexuality in 1997.
ChinaFile Recommends
10.02.15Gay Couples in China Look Abroad to Start a Family
WSJ: China Real Time Report
Xu Zhe decided a few years ago that he wanted to get married and have a baby—typical life plans for a young man in China.
ChinaFile Recommends
09.17.15The Chinese Government Is Censoring A Documentary About Mothers Who Love Their Gay Kids
Quartz
The upcoming court case of a filmmaker from Beijing, stands out.
ChinaFile Recommends
08.03.15For China’s Gay Men, Beijing Park Offers Haven
Los Angeles Times
Though illegal, Chinese media regularly report on gay home weddings and gay couples getting marriage certificates in the U.S.
ChinaFile Recommends
04.28.15Chinese Feminist Wants to be the Country’s First Openly Lesbian Lawyer
Washington Post
Li Tingting is determined that police harrassment will not stop her.
ChinaFile Recommends
04.02.15‘Masturbation Will Lead to Homosexuality’: China’s LGBT Sex-Ed Problem in Chinese
Nation
In a country where sex and sexuality remain taboo topics of discussion, such misinformation remains common.
Conversation
03.18.15Dark Days for Women in China?
With China’s recent criminal detention of five feminist activists, gender inequality in China is back in the spotlight. What does a crackdown on Chinese women fighting for equal representation say about the current state of the nation’s political...
Excerpts
03.16.15The Education of Detained Chinese Feminist Li Tingting
It is probably fair to say no woman has ever taken more flak for walking into a men’s room than Li Tingting. In the run-up to Women’s Day in 2012, the feminist college student was distressed by the one-to-one ratio of public restroom facilities for...
Sinica Podcast
09.19.14LGBT China
from Sinica Podcast
This week on Sinica, Jeremy Goldkorn and David Moser are joined by Fan Popo for a discussion of the way life works for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transsexual (LGBT) community in China. For those who have not heard of him, Fan is an accomplished...
The NYRB China Archive
09.14.14Sex in China: An Interview with Li Yinhe
from New York Review of Books
Li Yinhe is one of China’s best-known experts on sex and the family. A member of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, she has published widely on sexual mores, women, and family issues. Li also runs a popular blog, where she has advocated for...
ChinaFile Recommends
07.28.14China Activists Fight Gay ‘Conversion Therapy’
BBC
Gay rights activists in China are preparing for what they say could be a legal milestone in their fight to stop homosexuality being treated as an illness.
Media
01.23.14Out of the Dark Room
Photographers document China’s breakneck development in fractions of a second every single day. Yet the work of Chinese photojournalists remains largely unseen outside their homeland. Of the thousands of images of the country illustrating the pages...
ChinaFile Recommends
01.04.14Gay Love Theory as Fans Relish Sherlock in China
BBC
"Curly Fu" and "Peanut" are the names given by Chinese fans to Sherlock and his sidekick, Dr Watson, men who many Chinese fans like to think of as being in love.
Infographics
09.09.13Where Humiliation is Normal
from Aibai
Tolerance of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) individuals appears to be rising in Mainland China, at least among the digital generations. A February 2013 poll of users on Sina Weibo, one of China’s leading social networking sites,...
Conversation
07.03.13How Would Accepting Gay Culture Change China?
Last week's U.S. Supreme Court decision to strike down the core provisions of the Defense of Marriage Act is not only “a stride toward greater equality in the United States, but also a shift that will reverberate far beyond our shores,” wrote...
Sinica Podcast
05.03.13Sex in China
from Sinica Podcast
This week on Sinica, we deliver a salacious podcast that covers everything you always wanted to know about sex in China, but have been afraid to ask. And with a discussion that stretches from Daoist sex manuals and imperial sex customs to getting...
ChinaFile Recommends
03.05.13China Could Fix Its Oversupply Of Men By Letting Gays Marry
Quartz
China has tens of millions more men of marriageable age than there are women. Legalizing same-sex marriage would help solve China’s hugely problematic gender imbalance.
Media
02.12.13Joke About Gay Romance on Chinese New Year Gala Lights Up Blogosphere
Is “bromance” in the air? Not according to state-run China Central Television (CCTV).{vertical_photo_right}Thousands of fans yelled “Get together” in unison when piano prodigy Li Yundi made a guest appearance at Chinese-American pop sensation Leehom...
ChinaFile Recommends
01.24.13One of China’s Early AIDS Heroes Hounded into Hiding Identity
ABC
Tian Dawei was the first Chinese man to being a gay, HIV-positive man on state TV. He wanted to help people understand, but in China AIDS still carried a strong stigma.
ChinaFile Recommends
01.24.13“Cloud Atlas” Cut by 38 Minutes for China Audience
Associated Press
Nearly 40 minutes were cut from the Hollywood film “Cloud Atlas” for Chinese audiences, deleting both gay and straight love scenes to satisfy local censors.
Caixin Media
08.03.12Queerly Not Dangerous
Several authors of a “danmei” fiction website were recently detained by authorities. The injustice is so glaringly obvious that I can’t stop myself from saying something.Danmei (or “boys' love”) fiction is particularly interesting only to a...