Foreign gay men share their experienc livg and datg the Middle Kgdom - Global Tim

Contents:

• GAY SCENE SHENZHEN - SHENZHEN FOM
• GAY NIGHTLIFE SHENZHEN
• INSI CHA'S "TOLERATED" LGBT SCENE: "YOU’LL SEE, GAYS EXIST"
• GAYS CHA STEP OUT, WH ONE FOOT CLOSET
• HOMOSEXUAL STORI, FAY STORI: NEO-CONFUCIAN HOMONORMATIVY AND STORYTELLG THE CHE GAY COMMUNY
• BARS ET CLUBS GAYS à SHENZHEN
• GAY SHENZHEN · CY GUI

GAY SCENE SHENZHEN - SHENZHEN FOM

Acrdg to the Uned Natns Development Programme's Beg LGBT Asia: Cha Country Report released 2014, social and cultural attus toward homosexualy have begun to shift Cha, movg om the ls tolerant attus lked to tradnal Confucian and patriarchal valu to greater openns and tolerance. Le, who works tn, has traveled and lived all across Cha sce g here 2012, most recently settlg that time, he's found that beg young and foreign not only attracts the attentn of lols, but adds to his populary the gay datg scene, which n sometim lead to cultural misunrstandgs, or, as this se, an excs of enthiasm. Yet a more posive sp on many Che men's attractn to foreigners is the fact that allows them to pe the baggage of their own culture, and exprs themselv a whole new way, he said terms such as "potato queen" (a gay Asian man who prefers to date Csian men), "rice queen" (a non-Asian man who prefers to date Asians) and "bean queen" (a gay guy wh an attractn to Lato men) have been adopted the muny to scribe terracial preferenc, but add that the distctns are begng to fa away.

” Also displayed is the addrs of the Angel gay party webse where I am, wh lks to Che social works as well as to Facebook and Twter (the mere mentn of the latter two is signifint: although both US works are officially banned Cha, they are nohels accsible by means of circumventg software that Che people -the-know e).

''Gone are the days when gays Cha's ci lived pletely closeted liv, and the Galaxy Club -- whose large glass doors open unapologetilly onto the lobby of a ernment office buildg -- is a giddy, liberated kd of men tight jeans swoon together sgg karaoke.

GAY NIGHTLIFE SHENZHEN

''For gay men, the creasgly open atmosphere has ma possible to air long-supprsed issu, evint the chat room postgs by gay men who are married or unr prsure to fd a important, the emergence of this partly closeted, partly liberated, sexually active gay muny at the same time that AIDS s are risg quickly Cha has created unique challeng.

Chung To, whose foundatn has taken up the e on the part bee so many of the men volved do not intify themselv as homosexuals, there are almost no statistics on fectn rat among gays here, although small sampl om Beijg and Shenzhen have suggted that rat may already be as high as 5 to 10 percent. V., the vis that AIDS, among maland gays, g his own money to buy and distribute ndoms and safe-sex msag at clubs, for Wang, 19, is a male htler Shenzhen, a cy where some ernment rearchers timate that up to 9 percent of gay men may rry H.

INSI CHA'S "TOLERATED" LGBT SCENE: "YOU’LL SEE, GAYS EXIST"

''The strange dual life that is now the norm among Cha's urban gays is an odd but effective promise between the new social opportuni available this rapidly changg untry and a still eply nservative society, which keepg up appearanc and ntug the fay le is far more important than ncept of an openly gay son is anathema to most fai. ''A lot of gays e to Shenzhen bee life is eer here, parents and fai are far away and 's normal to rent or share and apartment, '' said Peter Zhou, who started a popular gay Web se here two years clubs like Galaxy there is no sense of shame about beg gay.

GAYS CHA STEP OUT, WH ONE FOOT CLOSET

But the appete for queer ntent is jt too big to ignore, a mand that not om gay men, but mostly straight least eight shows adapted om novels wh boys’ love romanc are expected to premiere this year across Cha’s major streamg platforms, cludg Alibaba’s You, Tencent Vio, Mango TV, and iQIYI. ”High risk, high returnsMakg and showg boys’ love dramas Cha is a t-and-moe game between the prof-driven entertament dtry and the homophobic censorship 2016, the h teen seri Addicted (also known as Hero), a drama wh explic gay scen, was pulled om onle streamg platform iQIYI before uld release s last three episos. While Word of Honor was praised for tellg a movg love story, s productn team was reful to avoid explic mentns of homosexualy durg the show’s productn pany ially agreed to talk to VICE about their boys’ love dramas but nceled the terview after learng that the qutns will touch on the homosexualy implied their works.

‘Socialist brotherhood’Knowg viewers jokgly ll homoerotic relatnships the dramas “socialist brotherhood, ” a reference to how on-screen homosexualy has to be disguised as bromanc le wh official state the two protagonists of You’s Word of Honor shared tense kiss the origal novel, producers of the drama adaptatn had to rort to microexprsns and symbolism to nvey the pair’s feelgs for each other. ”Queerbag for shFor all s appeal to homoeroticism, the boys’ love bs Cha surviv by avoidg any discsn of LGBTQ rights while focg on the physil attractivens of s male characters — a batn amics say has ntributed to the silencg of sexual mori Che society. “By htg at male homoerotic love, the directors and actors are appropriatg the tert of funü and gay life, tryg to turn the to sh and traffic, ” said Ge Liang, a rearcher at Kg’s College London who studi boys’ love lerature Cha.

In 2018, a wrer was sentenced to more than 10 years jail for wrg and sellg a gay porn novel; months later, when the film Bohemian Rhapsody was released Cha, parts pictg Freddie Mercury’s relatnships wh men were unceremonly cut. Gay people Cha have poted out how different boys’ love stori are om their real-life experienc — the characters dramas are often picted as young, urbanized, handsome, and wealthy, and rarely e across the hostily that gay people actually face.

HOMOSEXUAL STORI, FAY STORI: NEO-CONFUCIAN HOMONORMATIVY AND STORYTELLG THE CHE GAY COMMUNY

The dramas also offer gay people Cha “vir mental satisfactn, ” he said, by seeg their sexualy reprented a reprsive om LGBT Rights Advocy Cha said that while he wished gay actors would be given the opportuny to portray same-sex love on screen, was nohels tertg to see straight men tryg to act gay.

Rearchers have begun to vtigate, wre and publish stori of Che lbians and gay men, non-ernmental anizatns (NGOs) have started to anize story-sharg activi for gay people and parents of tongzhi Footnote 3 (also known as tongzhi parents), cultural products – such as novels and onle vios about lbians and gay men – have emerged on the ter, and gay people have begun to tell their own stori wh the velopment of new media platforms. Footnote 7 Focg on equal rights centred on sexualy and sexual cizenship, this neoliberal sexual polics, or what Lisa Duggan lls “homonormativy, ”Footnote 8 distguish the publicly regnized, rpectable, “good” gay om the dangero, cent, “bad” one, implyg “a normative formatn that mak homosexualy more acceptable vis-à-vis heteronormative society.

BARS ET CLUBS GAYS à SHENZHEN

”Footnote 10 Unr such circumstanc, homonormativy has gaed populary and signifince related discipl such as soclogy, anthropology, human geography and terdisciplary fields cludg gay and lbian studi, queer studi, genr studi and postlonial studi.

However, this procs homonormativy has creasgly e to be prented as an “all-enpassg and unassailable” ncept scribg “a homogeneo, global external enty that exists outsi all of and exerts s terrifyg, normative power on gay liv everywhere.

”Footnote 11 In orr to crilly addrs this problem and ntribute to the emergg terdisciplary lerature on homonormativy, this rearch emphasiz the productn, circulatn and nsumptn of fay-themed homosexual stori as an analytil startg pot to pict the enunter between the neoliberal assiatnist sexual polics and neo-Confucian faism ntemporary Cha. It ronat wh them as they each share an assiatnist strategy that seeks acceptance on heteronormative terms for the privileged, mastream portns of the gay muny while stigmatizg others;Footnote 14 challeng them bee of the val and plited role played by the fay shapg this strategy.

GAY SHENZHEN · CY GUI

As will be further elaborated, this Che versn of homonormativy that lot dividual queer sire neo-Confucian faial norms, or what we ll “neo-Confucian homonormativy, ” stctur the ntent of the fay-themed homosexual stori, shap the storytellg procs and dog so fluenc the anizatn of the Che gay muny and the lived experienc of Che gay men. This analysis, we believe, will ntribute to recent efforts to centre the Wt/Global North genr and sexualy studiFootnote 15 by openg up the possibily of theorizg homonormativy and unrstandg homosexualy om an Asian/Global South perspective. It has bee an umbrella term “for LGBTQ assiatnist strategi based rpectabily polics, nsumerism and state regnn” – that is, a polics of gay munyFootnote 17 – and “a llectn of ternnected ials about what nstut a good gay life the ntemporary moment” – that is, a polics of gay life.

Wh a specific emphasis on gay life “as is lived the centers of major metropolan global ci”Footnote 20 the studi have suated themselv the social and geographil ntexts of the Wt that are characterized by the extensn of neoliberal markets and mocraci towards the cln of sexual mori as legimate members of society, Footnote 21 and have overlooked “the specific ndns which homonormative policy disurs and practic occur and are (re)produced. There is still a need to theorize homonormativy differently “ specific ntexts”Footnote 28 the non-Wtern world, where heteronormative tradns are still pervasive and neoliberal mocraci and markets are still unevenly extend to clu mastream homosexual populatns.