Geng Le, the creator of Blued-one of China’s popular LGBT dating apps-and the grand marshal of the 2017 NYC Pride March, publicly reiterated the legitimacy of LGBT relationships in China and protested against the new regulations. Hence, when liberal legal scholars and human rights lawyers voice opposition toward the new CNSA regulations, they are arguing on a basis supported by China’s current legal framework.Īn increasing number of well-known professors and opinion leaders have shown that they are not afraid to publicly criticize authorities on this issue. In 2004, references to homosexuality were deleted from a section on “Polite and Civil Behavior” in the “Regulations on Reform of Criminals.” China also permits citizens to change their legal gender following sex reassignment surgery, a procedure that Jin Xing, who now hosts the country’s highest-rated late-night talk show, underwent in the late 1990s.
Although gay marriage is not yet legal in China, homosexuality was decriminalized when the national penal code was revised in 1997, and China’s Psychiatric Association removed the term from its list of mental disorders in 2001. Human rights lawyers and the LGBT community have criticized these actions as major steps backward. As a result, a popular Chinese web series, Addicted (上瘾), was removed from streaming services because the storyline centered on a gay high school couple.
In 2016, the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television (SARFT) published “ General Rules for Television Series Content Production,” which ban television dramas from depicting “abnormal sexual relationships and behaviors,” including same-sex relationships. In May 2017, the Cyberspace Administration of China released regulations for online news portals and network providers, which extend restrictions on content and subject all services to oversight by party-sanctioned editorial staff. However, recent steps in regulating online broadcasting have been discriminatory against the LGBT community, and this constitutes a serious setback in the drive toward an inclusive and open society. One of the objectives of improving this legal system is to create a more inclusive, mobile, and diverse society. Over the past two decades, China’s lawmakers and legal community have actively engaged in fashioning a modern legal system by continuously developing new regulations. Without these, the country would fall into chaos. Without a doubt, China’s rapid growth and social reform require a host of new laws and regulations.
She pointed out that her ban was just another example of China’s lack of free speech, and she denounced the constant deprivation of the LGBT community’s dignity. In spite of the ban, she published commentary to her WeChat account. Her post garnered thousands of reposts and likes before it was removed from the platform and Li was subsequently banned from social media for three months. Li Yinhe, China’s leading sexologist and a former research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, recently posted a 2000-word article to her Weibo account, arguing that the new regulation violates the constitutional rights of sexual minorities to express their sexual preferences. In a broader sense, this episode reflects the dynamic tension in present-day China between the party authorities, who increasingly use new laws and regulations to legitimize political control, and public interest groups, who strive to protect their rights through the existing legal framework. Many critics argue that this new regulation-particularly the way in which it restricts homosexual expression-is unlawful. The topic “Online Content Review Discriminating Against Gays” was viewed by millions.
Unsurprisingly, the regulation quickly sparked outrage on Chinese social media. China’s LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) community is particularly critical of this new regulation, not least of all because it lumps homosexuality in with sexual abuse and sexual violence as constituting an “abnormal sexual relationship.” The new regulation also bans stories on, images of, and references to homosexuality in online broadcasting.