Attitudes may have changed but discrimination continues to be widespread, whileLiu Dalin, a sexologist at the sociology college of Shanghai University, estimated about 90percent of homosexuals have or will get married due to family pressure.
Of the 1,259 gay men who responded to a 2008 survey by Zhang Beichuan, aprofessor at Qingdao University in Shandong province, 62 percent said they had never“come out” - when a person openly reveals their homosexuality. Nine percent said theyhad been fired from their jobs or forced to quit after employers discovered they were gay,and 5 percent believed their sexuality had affected their income and career development.
About one-fifth said they had suffered verbal and physical abuse. More shockingly, about35 percent of respondents admitted they had contemplated suicide, while 13 percent hadattempted it.
Liu Huaqing, a psychiatrist at the Beijing Huilongguan Hospital said he receivesmany patients suffering depression or looking to “correct” their sexual orientation. “Someare adolescents accompanied by parents and some are married men,” he said.
Discrimination has led to a large proportion of the nation’s estimated 30 million gaymen and women being forced to keep their sexuality a secret, said Zhang. However, thishas impacted the Ministry of Health’s attempts to prevent the spread of HIV and AIDS,with homosexual men having overtaken drug users as the most high-risk group.
In a recent government study, the infected rate among gay men in Beijing hasincreased to 4.9 percent, 10 times that of five years ago, according to Focus Magazine.
There were 48,000 new cases of HIV and AIDS reported in 2009, more than 32percent were infected through homosexual sex, the Ministry of Health said on Dec 1. Asthe vast majority is also married, health experts say the virus is quickly spreading amongthe female population, too.
More than 46 percent of the men polled by Professor Zhang agreed a more tolerantsociety and a law banning discrimination would help control the rate of infection. In a2008 survey by sexologist Li Yinhe, she discovered large sections of society strongly believean “openly gay person should not be allowed to teach in schools”, while many agreedhomosexuality was “completely wrong”.
China’s HIV and AIDS policies have in the main educated the public to be moretolerant, but “linking homosexuality so closely with the virus has also caused fear”,according to Wei Jiangang, a gay rights activist and co-founder of queercomrades.com.
Zhang once received a letter from a man who said his father was so upset about hisrelationship with another man that he killed his boyfriend. “I wrote to him and told himhe did not do anything wrong. His father was sent to prison,” he said.
The acceptance of gay men and women in Chinese society has been hampered bya long history of silence on the issue but the topic is finally being addressed in schools,said the professor. “A junior high school textbook printed in 2005 taught children aboutnot discriminating against homosexuals,” he said. However, it is still forbidden by law torefer to homosexuality in films, television shows or literature, even though it is no longerlisted as pornographic. Brokeback Mountain, for example, an Oscar-winning film about alove affair between two cowboys directed by Ang Lee, was not shown in cinemas on theChinese mainland.
When it comes to the homosexual population, the central government is focusedsolely on HIV and AIDS prevention, “they are still cautious on the other aspects”, saidZhang.
Mr Gay China, the country’s first beauty pageant for homosexual men, was called offjust an hour before opening in January. Organizers later picked contestant Xiao Dai, 25,from the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, as their representative for Mr Gay World2010 in Oslo, Norway in February 2010. He finished fourth in the competition.
The nation lacks a consistent policy towards homosexuality, according to Wan Yanhai,an AIDS prevention activist and director of the Aizhixing Institute of Health Educationin Beijing. “The authorities ignore most of activities but intervene when events cause toomuch attention,” he said.
Gay rights websites have also been affected by China’s ongoing war on porn, withseveral closed in 2008 as part of the crackdown.
To help prevent the spread of HIV and AIDS among gay men, the government in2007 invited more NGOs to get involved and called on the media to promote tolerance.
Li Yinhe said she will again propose legalizing same-sex marriage during the twosessions of the National People’s Congress, the nation’s legislature, in March 2010,while Zhang called for the government to introduce firm laws to ban discrimination. Aspokesman for the Ministry of Civil Affairs declined to comment.
However, many experts and gay people agreed that changing attitudes is a slowprocess.
“It took me years to come to ease with my homosexuality, so I don’t expect others toaccept me quickly,” said beauty pageant contestant Xiao Dai.
On the signature board at the entrance of the Mr Gay China event in January, gayrights activist Wei Jiangang wrote a 1925 quote by revolutionary leader, Sun Yat-sen:
“Revolution has not yet succeeded; our comrades need to push on.”
February 24,2010
Migrants cash in on labor shortage
As a labor shortage grips China, companies must pay up or risk shutting down.
Qiu Quanlin in Guangdong and Gao Changxin in Shanghai report.
In business, when demand far outweighs supply, it is always good news for the sellers -a fact that has not been lost on migrant workers amid the country’s labor shortage.
When the financial crisis hit manufacturers in South and East China in 2009, itwas the workforce that felt it most, with factories resorting to mass lay-offs and pay cutsjust to stay afloat. Now, orders are starting to flood back in and employers are once againdesperate for hands.
