The Hidn Liv of Gay Men Cha ‹ Lerary Hub

BEG GAY CHA HAS GOTTEN HARR UNR XI JPG

A more assertive, self-reliant Cha has rulted a subtle but nstant narrowg of gay spac * gay man in china *

A more assertive, self-reliant Cha has rulted a subtle but nstant narrowg of gay spacPhotographer: GREG BAKER/AFPHello, I’m Colum Murphy, a reporter on our Cha ernment team based Beijg, wh a look at the steady erosn of gay life Cha. There has been some excellent rearch to the emergence of gay and lbian inti Cha, cludg how the have been shaped by ro-Amerin ias of “gay sensibily” and characterised by “dividualy, difference, sophistitn, liberatn and morny”.

One 2018 study tailed gay bars Shanghai that rivalled those of any wtern pal, the anisatn of “pri” events and the tense ntexts which “queer” film ftivals and wir cultural productn and activism occur the face of ntued regulatn by the thorarian state. Inspired by those experienc, for the past eight years, I have been rryg out rearch wh gay men the regn and, 2018, pleted a PhD this explorg gay liv Haan. I wanted to fd out how gay liv are lived on the margs of global LGBT polics and activism, away om ci imaged as smopolan centr of morny.

A GAY MAN CHA

Gay men margal provc like Haan are claimg spac and buildg muni their own secret worlds. * gay man in china *

My rearch explor how gay men Haan unrstand themselv, build muni and negotiate the prsur to nform to the heterosexual life script of marriage and reproductn. I looked to how gay liv are figured out everyday teractns, how they are shaped by the spac which they unfold and how this plays out over time.

“When we get there, don’t say any gay stuff, ” Ah Tao warns me as we approach a shop the cut-out rner of a buildg at an tersectn wh an even narrower alley. When I first beme volved gay muni Haan back 2009, I was taken by iends to the sole gay bar Haikou, the provcial pal. In the island’s biggt ci, Haikou and Sanya, there are gay bars and tablished cisg areas certa parks, centrally loted yet variably beyond the view of the wir public.

Haikou’s current gay bar is accsed by climbg through a wdow on the fifth floor of an ageg tower block, out onto a balny, past a long dried-up swimmg pool and down a stg stairse.

THE DOUBLE LIV OF GAY MEN CHA’S HAAN PROVCE

Xiao Cao, a 57-year-old gay man, performs as a cultural revolutn red guard at a park. * gay man in china *

In Sanya, the well trodn pathways that criss-cross a bamboo grove where the edge of a park meets a riverbank are a by gay meetg spot, while the cy’s gay bar, durg the time of my fieldwork, was aga loted a dised hotel.

In the spac, fears of beg “outed” and the possible damage this uld do to fay and profsnal relatnships, mean that, as I was warned by Ah Tao, is bt not to “say any gay stuff”.

Careful regulatn of the language and knowledge that is allowed to circulate the spac ensur that gay men are only visible as gay men to one another.

FOR CHA’S GAY MEN, DONGDAN PARK BEIJG OFFERS HAVEN

Cha's gay men, stgglg wh stigma and social prsure to marry women and have children, pe to Beijg's Dongdan Park. * gay man in china *

Yet, the time spent the spac is marked by anxieti that, at any moment, cracks might appear the barrier between parallel gay and straight worlds.