The People’s BL

[blbeloved]

Challenging Common Perceptions About Sex and Sexuality on Chinese TV

Watching this video what strikes me is how the presenter is able to illustrate the important points she is making throughout her script’s narrative, with Ancient Danmei adaptation footage as well as scenes from other magnificent queer-coded historical CDramas, but there exists no other country on Earth you can replicate this for.

I was only vaguely interested in the substance of this setting-the-record-straight video (I knew most of this history already) but what really hit me was the extent of relevant visuals that could easily be assembled to support the text. In the opening introduction above, she is able to illustrate her points using visuals from several Chinese TV adaptations created from Danmei novels - Love Is More Than A Word; The Untamed ; WoH, and still didn’t run out of content for the next 20 minutes.

I have often wondered why it is that Chinese TV and China-based streaming platforms have dozens of EPIC, including fantasy, wuxia, cultivation, detective, martial, and imperial court Danmei or other queer homoerotic story adaptations featuring MM or FF love on a grand, 50+ episodes scale, but there is not even one single gay Game of Thrones in the ostensibly more “accepting, non-restrictive and uncensored” Anglophone queer media sphere.

While China has these in dozens, many rivalling or exceeding GoT or Marvel scope of ambition, it would be hard to find five big budget, blockbuster queer cinematic masterpieces each, from the prolific filmmaking Anglosphere, even if you were to ask for the historical or costumed as well as any modern era queer, big-budget spectaculars to be combined. An interesting paradox, isn’t it?

- What’s the Reason the West has Not Produced Even One Gay GoT? -

This I think is a valid enquiry but rarely have I come across comparative media analysis such as this really honest, moving and illuminating reflection by a queer American person inspired by his multiple re-watches of CDrama, The Rise of Phoenixes, in which the author tries to wrestle with this very conundrum.

Very different perspective from how most western viewers of Chinese queer media usually approach evaluating these types of productions which are often produced by Chinese queer people themselves. This is definitely partially a result of evaluating the products of other peoples’ culture on the basis of naturalising and elevating the shortcomings of the media you grew up on, and then imposing them as the minimum standards for everyone else everywhere.

Even many international viewers who are fans of a Danmei novel before its adaptation seem to forget Danmei is meant to stand as a disruptive, anti western-centric force, in active resistance to normative discourses of western narratives, and still tend to evaluate them from the limits of what is available at home.

Consequently, Chinese Dangai and mainstream queer-coded CDramas depart from Japanese and other BL traditions by not being primarily concerned with the currently existing world of individual queer students or salarymen as in Thailand, South Korea or Japan, but with imagining whole alternative worlds in which systemic transformations producing just, new civilisations can be carved out and impacted on by people who happen to possess same-sex desire and who use their queerness to change the world around them, not just who gets to sleep with whom.

It’s the idea of *transgressive male intimacy* that constitutes the central nervous system of Chinese BL, not merely transgressive male-male sex, hence a much more socially and politically panoramic romantic, emotional, and erotic potential is contained within a queer Chinese TV production (A Couple of Mirrors), even when it’s queer-coded (Nirvana In Fire) or an original screen play that’s barely ambiguous (Killer And Healer) or less covert (ABO Desire) than its international peers. Among regional BL film producing countries only China offers this magnitude of narrative depth and expanse at scale and it’s always nice to see that acknowledged.

Important to remember that China has no media rating system according to age, so there is no such thing as *NC*, *Adults Only*, *PG*, and so on; if a piece of media passes the quality test in China, that makes it equally good for everyone to consume. This means both a minor child and an adult can be inspired, informed, validated and entertained by the same outstanding works, for example Ne Zha 2.

Sort of adds another layer to perspectives on censorship and media freedom when it comes to diversity and accessibility of explicit and implicit queer representation; a single, narrow story that’s allowed to be told about men, masculinity and sexuality in any time period for a restricted audience, versus a wider creative pallet of options that are available for the enjoyment of the entire population of cinema and CDrama consumers.

Among other things, this comes in very handy for illustrating the odd script about the normalisation of queer love in China, both ancient and modern 😉.

Link to the Rise of Phoenixes article: https://www.currentaffairs.org/2021/01/the-refreshing-gender-politics-of-the-rise-of-phoenixes

The Refreshing Gender Politics of ‘The Rise of Phoenixes’

Seeing yourself on screen is a beautiful thing, even if you need subtitles.

Link to the full video the clip comes from: The Romance of Male Concubines in the Han Dynasty of Ancient China - https://youtu.be/WMCl-4SKjbs?si=FYSpo-c78n19RGa_

[blbeloved]

Love it! 👏🏽 🔥👏🏽🔥

For once people are starting to apportion blame for the flop-after-flop trend squarely on the mediocrity of the Directors IN CHARGE - where it belongs.

Just this morning I looked at some reviews of Only Fans Dream On and had to ask a friend who’s a mental health professional if this widespread delusion that fans are always to blame when a series disappoints while the Director assumes responsibility and takes the cheque and proudly emblazons his name on each and every episode - is not, is certifiable on the DSM yet.

Did fans toxic or non-toxic write the pointless script; approve every line of the dodgy storytelling; select and Direct the actors carelessly; sign off on every edit that goes in or stays out the disappointing final production; did they bequeath the Directors the regressive gender politics they are devoted to? The answer on every count is no.

Yet rarely is any criticism allowed of consistently unsatisfying Directors who are grotesquely exploiting and wasting the talents of some of the best young actors in Thailand - relentlessly and without shame or regret.

Instead there are revolting bullying campaigns to stop *thinking* fans of the acting couples, and of the genre on the whole, from pointing out the woefully inadequate productions these men are carting away huge sums of money for only to waste everyone’s time with NONSENSE.

Anyway big things are happening in Thailand and I’m here for it 😊

[blbeloved]

Gay Marriage and the Misrepresentation of Sexual Liberation

Some friends and I were mutually holding our breaths during the last few episodes of Revenged Love in case we got a wedding scene in the finale and boy are we relieved Chai Jidan and Gong Yu Shi didn’t let us down.

Why are we pleased? Because Revenged Love restored the Asian in Asian BL. Because the more western values are superimposed over Asian BL, removing it from its cultural roots, material history and grounded, contextual opportunities for transformation the more we see rainbow imperialism with the obligatory rainbow capitalism in the form of pride marches and homonormativity in the form of gay marriage - falsely and uncritically advanced as the ultimate sign of societal acceptance and queer liberation.

These extract the couples from their social, political and familial contexts and hyper-fixate on liberation as an individual enterprise when in reality there is no such thing. The noticeable result is that the community as a whole moves further away from emancipation not closer to it.

The shift that queer theorist Paul Preciado laments in the video is one we are seeing too in BL screenplay narratives, not just online discourses, that have generally gone alarmingly backwards in terms of its original radical queer feminist political stance.

First the wedding scene enthusiasts are looking at forms of cultural and customary expression that do not follow the logic of western rationality and demanding that they instead submit themselves to it as some kind of higher form of politics, instead of exercising epistemology autonomy within their own Asian cultural canons.

The shift from collective forms of liberation politics and organising, to individualised adaptation to an oppressive status quo by securing a privileged stake in existing social hierarchies - not dismantling them for oneself and others, is what Preciado calls attention to above.

This is the capitalist choice so it’s no wonder monopoly corporations, the think tanks and NGOs funded by capital and billionaire philanthropists, and NATO’s imperial national security states, are all United in backing this wholly inadequate approach to queer liberation.

As I’ve argued earlier https://www.tumblr.com/blbeloved/785248503812308992/chinese-censorship-isnt-the-most-important-thing, when pink capitalism and queer imperialism are ideologically exported and imposed overseas the purpose is for one thing only - that’s orienting the public at home to hostility and denial of empathy for the foreign country being targeted, and creating destabilising divisions in the country resisting western hegemony - For War. It’s called Manufacturing Consent and no progressive communities should be caught dead anywhere near these genocidal practices.

Post by @blbeloved · 1 video

💬 5  🔁 6  ❤️ 15 · Chinese censorship isn’t the most important thing about The Untamed. Why is it treated as though it is? When explicit tel

- *LGBT Rights* is an Indispensable Part of Imperialist Regime Change Operations -

The capital-friendly solutions that use the aesthetics of liberation to ensure the oppressive status quo remains structurally the same, have been installed in people’s brains through the help of media targeting racial minorities - eg Black Panther, romance media aimed at women from Mills and Boons to girlbossive Sex in the City, and through the cooptation of queer narratives as we have been witnessing in too many BL adaptations made in Neoliberal capitalist, pro-empire environments.

The LGBT acronym itself is a recent invention of the 1990s in the United States. Because the internet, including social media, search engines and corporate news and entertainment is dominated by the Anglosphere, online conversations refer to this term as if it were a globally accepted or uncontested political idea. This umbrella term is not embraced everywhere primarily because other cultures have their own nomenclatures for people on the basis of sex and sexuality, and secondly because it is already exclusionary - doesn’t include intersex or queer, and furthermore internecine battles are ensuing in the west to remove the T from LGBT making the concept even more exclusionary.

Most in the Global Majority embrace some indigenous notion of queerness because it is less exclusionary, more inclusive and it is also not restricted to what people do with their genitals but their entire being.

The LGBT acronym and the expectations that are supposed to come with it are of no use to queer communities in most countries in the Global South but when it comes to Actually Existing Socialist (AES) countries who explicitly don’t even operate on capitalist or western values, but whom the west sneeringly refer to as communist country-x (insert name of country imperial gangsters are targeting for destruction like China, North Korea, Venezuela or Cuba) its even more irrelevant to the wellbeing of gender and sexual minorities there.

There is not one single minority or vulnerable population whose lives have been improved by catastrophic NATO regime change bombardments or the almost equally deadly economic sanctions and capitalist blockades.

- What and Who is Even Driving Demand for Same-Sex Marriage? -

What do Western same-sex couples typically get married for besides the social capital and symbolism? Generally its also for practical reasons such as access to partner’s health care; the ability to appoint same-sex partners as officially recognised individuals for the purpose of legal rights vis a vis institutions such as hospitals and taxation, and for purposes of inheritance.

Relationships should be based on love not economic precarity or economic advantage. This however is the best capitalism has to offer. Not so in the former or the current Socialist countries.

In “communist China” all citizens already have these most basic of human rights - rights to universal health care; housing, land, and education; a living wage plus rent and price controls; no personal income tax; to designate a legal person of any sex to act in their interests while incapacitated; and for same sex couples to have legal guardianship of minor children - all as a condition of citizenship, and if challenged they have official recourse to justice if any of these are denied a Chinese citizen on the basis of sexuality.

Countries where citizens routinely lack these social and political guarantees 101 that they have been trying and failing to get for 100 years, somehow feel it is the Chinese Socialists who are materially oppressed and living under an ideologically authoritarian state lol.

After the what-for there’s the question of who. And that’s another contradiction about who is getting same-sex married in the places where it currently exists and exists for longest and what it tells us about the relationship to liberatory politics?

Each time I see a gay married couple in Thailand or a wedding celebration in Taiwan I wonder why the highly “politicised” (read propagandised) western BL fandom never questions why it is always pictures of celebrants who are urban, middle-class, usually university-educated, professional, childless gay Males and never throngs of poor, unprivileged, manual labourers in rural settings with responsibility for dependent children and elderly relatives, and who don’t embrace western identity markers?

It’s the exact same social profile in Asian countries that allow gay marriage as in Europe and North America where same-sex marriage exists.

Why do you think that is?

Lesbian households are incidentally the ones most likely to include children in the queer community, not gay male married couples (one of the reasons BL women creators are at pains to write the raising and care of small children into fictional gay male households as something that ought to be standard in a society where social norms have been anywhere near consequentially transformed).

If this disparity remains unchanged it has important negative implications for the reduction of gender oppression societally because it means the more powerful sex class in the queer community unloads the social burden of reproductive labour in families and societies onto queer women in ways that mirror the tendencies of the more powerful sexual class in straight populations - straight men.

There are therefore many questions as to whether this particular constellation of factors suggests gay marriage is a contributor to or even a sign of gay liberation - which as we know cannot be conceived of or achieved on an individual but only collective basis.

What form of economic subordination does the reality of gay marriage oppose? What transformed economic relations has it enabled? Is there evidence individual gay marriage is leading to a socially impactful reduction in structural oppression anywhere; is it helping to dismantle gender or sexual privilege — or to entrench it for all but a few? And if not what’s the anxiety for Global South countries like China to enter this same political culdesac? What is the reason?

Actually Existing Socialist (AES) countries and material analysis have a critique and an answer but that’s an unfamiliar discussion for most so I’ll save that for another post later and leave everyone to ponder the questions and contradictions arising from an ineffective tactic that gets talked about as an unqualified, strategic good.

[blbeloved]

Oppressed genders have long considered marriage hell on Earth but compromised as a way to survive patriarchal economic and social injustice, but in countries dominated by western, capitalist indoctrination, if it’s a same-sex couple this same institution of marriage miraculously becomes a liberation 😆

I think we can safely predict every mediocre BL, and now GL is also affected, will use marriage as some kind of fake-progressive figleaf as well as a defence against critique of deeply reactionary and laughably immature politics within the writing - which is the same as saying the reactionary and immature politics of the Director himself.

This is the reason why, without artistic integrity, they cannot Direct a winning series without hyper-exploiting acting pairs that the power of women fans - and a better Director, have already made great.

[blbeloved]

Won’t someone please think of the Americans

Latest World Bank (an institution controlled by the US and western capitalist countries) data says the share of the population living in extreme poverty, based on the quality of life your money can buy you, is higher in the US than China.

Aaaw these poor Chinese; they don’t have the freedom to be homeless, lacking in universal health care, to eat non-nutritious food and pay exorbitant prices for utilities and the daily necessities of life like transportation, information technology and clothing.

This is not a glitch or an accident; this is the point of capitalism - to inexorably concentrate wealth in the hands of a tiny minority and to increasingly immiserate the masses. The ultra rich and the ultra poor are necessary conditions of a system which cannot survive without generating inequality.

That’s why the existence of socialist countries are seen as a “threat” to the west. Hence the never ending wars all aimed at suppressing development in the global south - from North Korea and Vietnam to Cuba, Angola, Burkina Faso, Nicaragua, Grenada, Syria, Iraq, Iran and dozens more, all initiated by the US and NATO for the express purpose of forcing countries into capitalism in order to keep them poor and dependent.

The day Americans realise en masse that without the existence of a powerful socialist formation like the Soviet Union (USSR was forcibly collapsed because of traitorous, western-backed comprador leaders AGAINST the wishes of the vast majority of Soviet citizens) nothing has been able to force the US to provide decent wages and conditions, will be the start of wisdom in that country for what true democracy and freedom really means - in reality not in the abstract. In fact the fall of the Soviet Union has been a tragedy for the entire global majority. For details on how see Pawel Wargan’s The Neoliberal Holocaust in Peace Land and Bread.

As the scales of a lifetime of anti-communist indoctrination start falling from western eyes expect to see a lot more anti-China propaganda and war mongering against China for this reason and this reason only.

[dre759]

Happy Pride month!!!

In the class struggle, it is imperative for the movement to break free of its own capitalist bosses and their ideology. In that case, the movement is only as powerful as it is independent.

But what about a socialist country in which the laboring class rules and is trying to build socialism in the liberated turf of a workers' state?

An international network of both LGBT social democrats and those far to the right of them in the imperialist countries, particularly the U.S. and Britain, makes an appeal to Cubans, and others in countries menaced by imperial powers, to identify with them based on what is presumed to be shared identity. In turn, this network asserts its readiness to defend gay and lesbian Cubans and others—but only against their own people, culture and national liberation struggle.

When aligned with overall and sometimes specific imperialist interests, such a position can offer a "left cover" for regime change—through covert and/or military intervention.

[…]

A socialist revolution is a process, not a single act. Solving the economic and social problems that the capitalists cannot and will not tackle is the dynamic forward motion of revolution.

[…]

It is the LGBT movements in the imperialist citadels that have to break with their own ruling classes in order to build bonds of genuine international solidarity. It’s a hard position to take. It requires ideological valor; the refusal to remain silent about the emperor’s “new” clothing.

-Leslie Feinberg, Rainbow Solidarity: In Defense of Cuba Pgs. 91-92

[blbeloved]

“It is the LGBT movements in the imperialist citadels that have to break with their own ruling classes in order to build bonds of genuine international solidarity.”

Leslie Feinberg, Rainbow Solidarity: In Defense of Cuba

[blbeloved]

Brian Berletic on the importance of Sovereignty-Seeking Global South Countries Protecting their Information Space as a Critical Theatre of Resistance to Imperialist Ideological Warfare

That’s what US “aid” and their NGOs are for - WAR. Nothing else. It is to evacuate empathy for the country under ideological attack by using atrocity propaganda to manufacture consent for illegal and unjust wars to liberate the inhabitants from retaining the surplus from their land and labour.

It’s not for freedom and democracy; it’s not for human rights; it’s not to end ethnic suppression; and it’s damn sure not to liberate any single woman or lgbt person in countries the US has targeted for imperialist regime change.

Brian Berletic is discussing Thailand, where he lives and works for decades, and the way countries that are reluctant or incapable of defending their information space from the ideological onslaught of the US security state - what political neophytes whose only analytical lens is identity politics call “censorship”, end up where that country and its regional neighbours are today. At War.

Wars that are for the purpose of de-development, de-industrialisation, the halting of economic sovereignty and forcing the subjugated country back into the fold of capitalist imperialist extraction and impoverishment. See also completed projects of Syria, Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan just to name some of the most recent; and also the projects in motion now - Russia, Iran; Palestine; Haiti; Bolivia; Venezuela; Cuba; DRC; Nigeria; Sudan; China and many more.

This is the purpose for which the whole world is in flames.

[blbeloved]

Aof truly needs to step aside now

Like from the whole industry. And take Jojo too btw.

In what world is the most famous and much-loved acting duo getting 200k views on a free app on a FIRST episode??? Common man!

If they had a better screenplay and a better director this is not the reception they would’ve received. How is it possible the showing was better when they were just UNKNOWN actors no one had heard of before?

He has got to go; anything that puts these young actors out of this embarrassing waste of their tremendous talent.

[ao3commentoftheday]

I don't know if it's just me being in small fandoms, but fandom as a whole feels...really lonely as of late. People have split themselves up so much that they don't discuss things the way they did before, they just kind of post their stuff and leave and half their audience "consumes" it like "content". There's no comments, barely kudos, the only places fans talk with each other anymore are on private discord servers that no one ever finds out about...I don't know, I'm a bit of an old and I feel like I'm screaming out into the void for no reason at this point. Sure, "somebody" will like my stuff, but will I ever get to know about it?

I think about this kind of thing a lot, anon, and I think my generation (Gen X/xillennial) kind of did folks dirty a bit.

In our defense, we didn't know we were.

I'm an educator by profession, as well as on this hobby blog, and so I spend a lot of time thinking about how people learn things. A lot of learning is social, and a lot of it happens when parents teach their children.

When I was growing up, pre-internet, my parents taught me how to talk to other adults in our community, how to play with other children, how to order food in a restaurant, how to call a business and ask a question. They literally walked me through how to do all of that stuff and more because those were daily skills in the world at that time.

We've spent the last 20+ years talking about how kids today are "digital natives" - but have we spent enough time teaching kids how to keep a conversation going when you're not in the same room as the other person? How to leave a comment on a post by a person you don't know? How to show your appreciation to a content creator? What a content creator even is and how that differs from a fan creator?

I know there are a lot of jokes out there about different things that would kill a Victorian child, but I think what would actually be difficult for them would be the lack of rules and instructions that kids today receive from the adults in their lives.

I don't have kids myself, so maybe this is all just bullshit and I'm talking directly out of my ass. But a LOT of the time when I notice someone doing something 'wrong' it's because no one ever told them how to do it right.

I kind of suspect that might be part of what's happening in fandom these days. Combine the above with the fact that fandom got inundated with new members in 2020 during quarantine and lock downs, and it's not surprising to me that a large percentage of the people in fandom today don't approach things the way that we used to before.

i don't fault them for it. When fandom was smaller and the internet was new, we used to take the time to bring people in. But now, it feels like 'everyone knows XYZ' so why does it need to be taught? And with how fast things move, it's more rare for newcomers to lurk for a while before they dive into everything.

This is a very long answer to a problem that probably just needed a listening ear, but I hope what you take away from this is an understanding that you're not the only one who feels the difference. I see this same experience shared in the notes on my posts all the time.

There is no easy fix for the situation and it certainly won't be fast to change, but maybe if we mentor a bit more when we have the spoons to, we can shift the culture a bit? One fan at a time?

If you managed to get all the way to the end of this, do yourself a favour and leave a comment on a fic or reblog a post with some chatty tags. DM somemeone or tag them or send them an ask just to let them know you see them and you think they're cool.

Even if nothing happens as a result, you tried. And maybe you just made someone's day. 💗

[blbeloved]

Best Chinese drama of 2025 hands down is This Thriving Land!

Already passed 1.5 Billion plays while airing and after it was done it still beating the currently airing top dramas by a colossal margin.

But these quantitive indicators aren’t the true test of its value; rather it’s the way This Thriving Land vividly portrays the point the world is at - one where imperialist nations are once again desperate to launch or provoke wars of aggression that return the Global South to an ideal state of neo-colonial extraction along with the vassalisation of the EU/NATO states.

At this time a message of hope is that here IS an alternative to capitalism which will usher in the end of imperialism. What does imperialism have to do with capitalism? African Professor Jason Hickel succinctly explains.

Previously the Global South carried the weight of the burden of generating capitalist profits in the Global North but after 40 years of NeoLiberalism, today even the majority in the western core of empire and in the subordinated coloniser European states are also crying out, as developing countries step up their resistance to the centuries of domination and plunder on which western hegemony has built its wealth. This in turn compels western monopoly capital to gouge domestic populations in the imperial core even more savagely to maintain income amid an intensifying and widespread crisis of profitability.

One of the reasons developing nations are able to resist substantially is because of the success of China’s model of development which has succeeded in rejecting capitalism without being destroyed, and has also been extending the benefits of its return to being the most powerful economy in the world to not just neighbouring countries in Asia but also to the rest of the global South including Africa, Latin America and sovereignty-seeking countries in Eurasia such as Russia.

I was really misty during the last few episodes reflecting on how the 1930s/1940s circumstances of This Thriving Land is the world we in the Global Majority still live in today. In Palestine, in Iran, in Sudan, in Russia, in DRC, in Venezuela, in China, in Cuba, in the Sahel Alliance, in Syria, Bolivia, Libya and throughout large swathes of Latin America, Africa and Asia. It was extremely inspiring and uplifting to watch!

Ok back to TTL and why no one in their right mind is fighting wars of liberation just to retain genocidal liberal capitalist democracy lol.

- What Was The Point of All That Emphasis on Political Consciousness and Grassroots Resistance in TTL? -

The last third of the drama was the part many westerners, even those who praised the drama highly, felt the most disconnected from. Why?

Because in western universities and universities in countries emerging from classical colonialism but still existing in NeoColonial subjugation and therefore still follow the historical negationism and knowledge systems imposed by the west, China’s real role in the stories we are told about World War 2 has largely been written out.

Collectively, it was the Communists of the Soviet Union (27 million deaths) and of China who bore the brunt of the fighting and suffered the heaviest losses, compared with fewer than one million from the armies of USA, France and Britain, yet western history textbooks claim that the WW2 victory was a triumph of liberal capitalist democracy.

China, and Communists, did more to free the world of fascist tyranny than most of the western, capitalist imperial nations combined.

In progressive and Socialist Global South countries outside the West where educational systems are independent however, China is recognised as the first country to wage war against fascist occupation, culminating in the Chinese People’s War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, which turned out to be decisively important in the overall global victory over fascism.

Without China’s endurance over Fourteen Years (14 compared with 4 years in the European theatre of war), Japan might have been able to overrun Asia and then invade the Soviet Union and Western Europe in concert with the other fascist power - Germany.

Instead, for 10 years before the US joined the anti-fascist war Chinese nationalists, Communists and ordinary peasants forced Japan into a prolonged war of attrition by tying down the vast majority of the Japanese army, limiting its capacity elsewhere and buying vital time for the Allies. Between 1931-45, over 400 million ordinary Chinese put their lives on the line of resistance and China suffered over 35 million casualties, with around 20% of its people being made refugees, just as we witnessed in the final episodes of This Thriving Land.

Ordinary industrial workers in cities and farmers in the rural areas had to throw aside capitalistic values and join a collective, communal struggle for survival by the means they had at their disposal, such as denying food to the imperial Japanese invaders, which came at great costs to themselves.

Some capitalist compradors like Feng NiWei, sided with the imperialists, compromising the collective survival of whole towns for their own individual security but luckily these were not in the majority as even illiterate populations understood the central oppressive force was capitalist imperialism - not their fellow poor workers, not refugees/immigrants (people really still fall for this cynical, divisive *ish today which is why they’re not even trying to be free).

There’s no such thing as individual liberation - this is another capitalist psyop.

In those harsh 14 years of resistance, Chinese forces and defensive bands of ordinary Chinese people in towns and villages killed, wounded, or captured 1.5 million Japanese invaders, accounting for over 70% of the total losses suffered by Imperial Japanese forces in WW2.

The 80th Anniversary of the surrender of imperial Japan to China is being celebrated right now in Beijing with Heads of States representing more than half of humanity attending in solidarity.

These anniversary celebrations of 80 years of peace is currently being censored in western media because there is no place with more widespread censorship than within the empire itself. Some highlights of the 80th Anniversary Parade: https://x.com/carlzha/status/1963086861494321458?s=61&t=Ldh9JmfcEKSK5X1hFzSxQA.

Just imagine that after all this sacrifice and forced de-development which impoverished Chinese people for at least another generation (America the only country left standing because it’s territory wasn’t physically involved in the war and made tons of money by selling its weapons to the Europeans involved in the war helped it’s supposed Axis enemies Germany and Japan financially get back on their feet but did not help China or the Soviet Union!!!) China immediately had to go and help Socialist Korea fight for its liberation from American imperialists. That war has never ended but the stalemate has resulted in Korea being split in two - one capitalist and one socialist, while a low grade war of sanctions, intimidation and propaganda from the west continue to impact the lives of Koreans in North Korea.

Why do most people in the west know nothing of this history or the significance of what is going on in China today for the majority of humanity, an American living in China has a take:

Some of the most prominent criticism of This Thriving Land from serious history buffs is that they didn’t portray the serious atrocities (such as killing civilians competitions, industrial rapes, and bayoneting babies challenges👇) of the invading imperial Japanese army strongly enough but I think I understand what they were doing here with this family drama, instead of emphasising all the many terrible things that were done to Chinese people, they focused on how people were creative and resisted communally, and not just survived, but triumphed over a very powerful adversary.

For more on this you can find free online copies of Iris Chang’s bestselling book, The Rape of Nanking, detailing the horrors of the inciting incident that made Chinese people rise up; there is also a movie out now in time for the 80th anniversary commemoration called Dead To Rights which gives a more uncompromising treatment in documenting particular war crimes for which the Japanese have never apologised and even deny in political statements and school curricula.

Dead to Rights

In 1937, during the Nanjing Massacre, postman A Chang pretended to be a photo developer to save his life. He developed photos for the Japane

[blbeloved]

Magnolia Awards of the 2026 Shanghai TV Festival Best TV series nominees - including a few of my personal favourites from last year, have been announced this week:

This Thriving Land

Silent Honor

Legend of the Magnate

Man’s Inhumanity to Man

Uncle

A Better Life

Born to Be Alive

Swords Into Plowshares

Strange Tales of Tang Dynasty 3

Legend of Zang Hai

Pleased to see some nominations for some well deserved actors like Yu Hewei and Directors and Actors of some of my top Drama watches of 2025, especially This Thriving Land which in addition to Best Drama is also up for:

Best Actress: Yang Mi

Best Adapted Screenplay: Wang He

Best Director: Liu Jia Cheng

Best Supporting Actor: Lin Yongjian

Best Supporting Actor: Ni Dahong

Best Supporting Actress: Chi Peng

Best Supporting Actress: Qin Hailu

There are also a few more that escaped my attention in a year I was spoilt for choice that I need to get in my current watchlist. Zhù dàjiā hǎo yùn!

[blbeloved]

ART!!

This Director, writers and actors responsible for East Palace, West Palace (1996) perfectly dramatise what it means to be queer, what it means to not just confront but to understand masculinity as a gay man, and its also a treatise on exactly how much joy, authenticity and humanity masculinity strips from men.

Beautiful, artistic, violent, poignant and hopeful all describe this pathbreaking film, said to be the first mainstream Chinese production that is explicit about same-sex struggles - both within and against society and family, but also the most painful and bitter struggle that takes place within oneself.

One of the most striking scenes is A’Lan’s recounting to Officer Xiao Shi of his first time with another man, when he discovered masculinity and what it was like to be ‘the girl having sex with the boy’. This cognitive distortion that is gender performance of masculinity, far more than his sexuality, is what defines and distorts his relationship with sexual desire and his desperate pursuit of love with other men on these blighted terms.

One thing East Palace, West Palace is *not* about is “authoritarian Chinese” state repression or some kind of uniquely Chinese way of doing down the gays or any of the knee jerk McCarthyist insufferable western review points that infest this space 🙄. We know this, because we can picture the same exact scenes of cruising, police harassment and entrapment, as well as the internalisation of harmful, high risk community practices in every single country on the planet even today - including in countries with legal provision for same-sex marriage and other formal rights-based policies.

My feelings really resonate with those incomparably set out in his MDL review by Ariel Alba, a gay man of the revolutionary Global South and an academic expert on queer media so I will leave you to explore that review here.

The tenderness, the brutality, the honesty, he confesses of how much he wants - no, needs to give himself to masculine power has shaped A’Lan’s whole life, frustrated his happiness and cemented his constant loneliness. His collision with Police Officer Xiao Shi is therefore no chance meeting for *either man* and that coming together of one closeted and in-denial, and the other fatalistic but resigned in acceptance of a future of thrilling self-abnegation, is ultimately a potentially life changing event for both men.

You can watch East Palace, West Palace on YT.

[evergreen-femme]

at some point you have to realize that you actually have to read to understand the nuance of anything. we as a society are obsessed with summarization, likely as a result of the speed demanded by capital. from headlines to social media (twitter being especially egregious with the character limit), people take in fragments of knowledge and run with them, twisting their meaning into a kaleidoscope that dilutes the message into nothing. yes, brevity is good, but sometimes the message, even when communicated with utmost brevity, requires a 300 page book. sorry.

[blbeloved]

Once again fools lacking any class analysis left scratching heads over massive support for alleged incestuous sexual abuser

Both the “liking” actors and the woefully absurd and insincere “apologies” after the fact, stem from the same logic - the desire to uphold and maintain CLASS Privilege.

These political mercenaries couldn’t care less about lgbt people - I truly have to laugh at that so-called BL expert who keeps asserting Thai BL actors can still be considered advocates against queer oppression or queer exploitation because they participate in corporate sponsored pride festivals or are the face of NED-underwritten gay marriage activism in Thailand.

They certainly do not have any interest in challenging the sexual violence surrounding masculinity, just in case looking at the BL works that glamourise this particular aspect of manhood that they enthusiastically lend their star power to for money, hasn’t tipped people off yet. Sorry they’re Not Sorry!

This is Class Collaboration much more than it is anything to do with homophobia - for or against. Some of these actors are gay fgs yet they have have been able to align to express their solidarity actors across lines of gender and sexuality. They are circling the rich man’s wagon to protect one of their own capitalist elites, but also to signal to their corporate backers and handlers where their real loyalty lies. If that means issuing a pathetic excuse for an apology after they have been rumbled, they will definitely do that because the transparently lying and dumb “oops mea culpa” - to angry fans Not The Victim, is also related to a bloody cheque. Don’t get it twisted.

Patriarchy and capitalism reinforce each other but they reinforce each other in a United goal to *enable capitalist exploitation*.

This what happens when a mf don’t read theory and relies on corporate-funded identity politics to understand social phenomenon in the neoliberal age.

You will always be none the wiser while they get richer off your failure to understand material reality while focussing exclusively on symbolism and spiritual bad vibes.

[blbeloved]

From the mouth of the victim himself: It just reflects what the BL celebrities prioritise, which is property over justice.

Even this young man is able to grasp what his older colleagues in the acting business, the silent gay Directors and many so-called fans of BL could not. It’s a major ethical failing to prioritise property rights over rights to sexual justice.

What’s extra tragic is that these corrupt choices are completely in line with GMM’s ethos on BL where money is prioritised way over and above the ethics and integrity around what goes on in the industry.

When presented with a chance to support an actual queer person and help fight oppression, the BL boys and girls chose to support money instead of condemning rape or even sympathising with the victim. The company then immediately followed up with a barrage of distraction tactics to try to quickly escape any accountability.

Their only consistency is wanting to exploit BL and BL fandom - queer and straight, with zero responsibility..

[captainjoongki]

perfect crown was a fascinating scientific experiment at the end. it was a hallmark romcom for 50% of its run and then decided it wanted to become a political intrigue drama and then became the a hallmark romcom again for the ending. but the writing, oh the pathetic, bad, chatgpt borderline writing, never even was able to do any of this well.

zero plot consistency, zero writing consistency, zero arc consistency, possibly the all-time worst writing i have seen for a male lead in ages (aura farming! is not good writing!!!!!!!!!), both the leads were just privileged losers who acted like high schoolers at the end, zero comprehension of how politics works. the entire drama was made to show off filtered glamour but it wasn't even entertaining. oh let's abolish the monarchy so i can go back to being a rich ceo and you can cook <3 that's how teenagers think. that's not how adults think. that's not how the world works. you do not just "abolish the monarchy girls" and everything goes back to normal! because now who did that power go to, prince yian? the very same cabinet and politicians like a story arc is not things going to the same place they started but even more childish.....

the villains were an utter calamity. noh sang hyun.......idek what they did to your character. queen mother was the goat of the drama because without her, what would the leads have even done? she fixed everything for them! what is more amusing to me is that goong and my princess that both aired like 1-2 decades ago had a more mature handling of the monarchy and showed better writing.

and finally, for a drama centered around a MARRIAGE CONTRACT, what the fuck even happened there??

[dangermousie]

That fact that Goong handled that topic (stifling rules and backbiting in the royal family and class issues and being the unloved son and what not) much better 20 years ago and while literally being about teens is insane!

And My Princess, while I didn’t love it as much as Goong, was a lesson on having a fluffy Royal romcom with low stakes that is still not illogical.

People found The King: Eternal Monarch messy and it wasn’t about royalty anyway despite its protag being an AU King, but even leaving aside my loving it - it actually had things to say and functioned as a narrative.

(Not even getting into King 2 Hearts which is one of my favorite dramas of all times but also involved actual intrigue and stakes and adults!)

[captainjoongki]

YES. older kdramas may not have had a budget backing them, but they sure had a proper script for 16-20 episodes that had something to say and well plotted characters. even with the king, at least kim eunsook didn't back down from her plot to succumb to the glamour of it she stood by it and showed all of it, messiness included.

all these dramas mentioned felt heartfelt and real and the OTPs were all ones i rooted for because the dramas had proper stakes. none of that was here. once again, i am sticking by my notion that PC was just harry and meghan y/N fanfiction that was poorly done as well.

[romchat]

+1 to all of this. My main problem with contemporary Kdramas as someone who watched them from 2007-2012 and then took a break until 2022 is that writers are afraid of committing to their premise. You have all these interesting threads a story like Perfect Crown could explore and then it just doesn’t want to put in the thought work to do so.

[blbeloved]

Dropped it at Ep 1 and remain impressed with the stamina of viewers to wade through for several weeks.

Writing quality is the most essential part of any drama and unfortunately the one thing that can never improve from episode to episode.

Predicted this from the start as soon as Netflix ploughed it’s first $2 or $3 billion “investment” in the Kdrama industry which, as it has done in desecrating cultural authenticity everywhere else in the world it deploys its money, is always going to drive *down* quality while quantitative indicators like budget allocated to employment-killing technologies go up; South Korea is sadly no exception.

AvenueX has been saying this in the last few years now too.

[blbeloved]

Netflix effect

Comments from South Korean viewers themselves.

I can’t help noticing it’s always the respected, popular actors they choose for these projects that are purposely left holding the can for institutional failures.

[blbeloved]

Nanon speaking out against rape apologia as a man once again showing why he is constantly at odds with the Thai BL Mediocrity Industrial Complex 👏🏽

Unlike the rest of his pro-rape GMM colleagues he criticises disingenuous gaslighting responses, such as the ones used against Nong Psi like: “This is a personal matter,” and “Why is he only speaking up now?”, emphasizing instead the importance of believing victims.

In almost every single case there’s nothing whatsoever to be gained when a sexual assault victim tells the truth and seeks justice - except vitriol, suspicion and wall-to-wall smearing, and even less if they lie.

A translated extract from the article categorically asserts: “No one deserves to have their human dignity violated. However, we often see parts of society treating the issue as ‘not that serious’, this is the concept of a ‘rape apologist,’ people who minimize the violence of rape or place blame on the victim. Sometimes, people support the abuser simply due to personal closeness or relationships, before even listening to the victim. This contributes to a culture of impunity and silence. Without realizing it, this may reinforce the so-called ‘rape culture,’ where violence is minimized or ignored. Some people use a victim’s identity to question the abuse. In the case of LGBTQ+ victims, there are those who dismiss them by claiming they are ‘exaggerating,’ reinforcing harmful stereotypes and causing their reports to be discredited. Rape is a serious and unacceptable form of violence. It is not necessary to ‘take sides,’ but it is essential not to downplay someone’s suffering or invalidate their pain. This alone is already an important step toward reducing the emotional and social impact of violence.”

Most GMM actors and All the GMM BL Directors Could Neva!

[captainjoongki]

perfect crown was a fascinating scientific experiment at the end. it was a hallmark romcom for 50% of its run and then decided it wanted to become a political intrigue drama and then became the a hallmark romcom again for the ending. but the writing, oh the pathetic, bad, chatgpt borderline writing, never even was able to do any of this well.

zero plot consistency, zero writing consistency, zero arc consistency, possibly the all-time worst writing i have seen for a male lead in ages (aura farming! is not good writing!!!!!!!!!), both the leads were just privileged losers who acted like high schoolers at the end, zero comprehension of how politics works. the entire drama was made to show off filtered glamour but it wasn't even entertaining. oh let's abolish the monarchy so i can go back to being a rich ceo and you can cook <3 that's how teenagers think. that's not how adults think. that's not how the world works. you do not just "abolish the monarchy girls" and everything goes back to normal! because now who did that power go to, prince yian? the very same cabinet and politicians like a story arc is not things going to the same place they started but even more childish.....

the villains were an utter calamity. noh sang hyun.......idek what they did to your character. queen mother was the goat of the drama because without her, what would the leads have even done? she fixed everything for them! what is more amusing to me is that goong and my princess that both aired like 1-2 decades ago had a more mature handling of the monarchy and showed better writing.

and finally, for a drama centered around a MARRIAGE CONTRACT, what the fuck even happened there??

[dangermousie]

That fact that Goong handled that topic (stifling rules and backbiting in the royal family and class issues and being the unloved son and what not) much better 20 years ago and while literally being about teens is insane!

And My Princess, while I didn’t love it as much as Goong, was a lesson on having a fluffy Royal romcom with low stakes that is still not illogical.

People found The King: Eternal Monarch messy and it wasn’t about royalty anyway despite its protag being an AU King, but even leaving aside my loving it - it actually had things to say and functioned as a narrative.

(Not even getting into King 2 Hearts which is one of my favorite dramas of all times but also involved actual intrigue and stakes and adults!)

[captainjoongki]

YES. older kdramas may not have had a budget backing them, but they sure had a proper script for 16-20 episodes that had something to say and well plotted characters. even with the king, at least kim eunsook didn't back down from her plot to succumb to the glamour of it she stood by it and showed all of it, messiness included.

all these dramas mentioned felt heartfelt and real and the OTPs were all ones i rooted for because the dramas had proper stakes. none of that was here. once again, i am sticking by my notion that PC was just harry and meghan y/N fanfiction that was poorly done as well.

[romchat]

+1 to all of this. My main problem with contemporary Kdramas as someone who watched them from 2007-2012 and then took a break until 2022 is that writers are afraid of committing to their premise. You have all these interesting threads a story like Perfect Crown could explore and then it just doesn’t want to put in the thought work to do so.

[blbeloved]

Dropped it at Ep 1 and remain impressed with the stamina of viewers to wade through for several weeks.

Writing quality is the most essential part of any drama and unfortunately the one thing that can never improve from episode to episode.

Predicted this from the start as soon as Netflix ploughed it’s first $2 or $3 billion “investment” in the Kdrama industry which, as it has done in desecrating cultural authenticity everywhere else in the world it deploys its money, is always going to drive *down* quality while quantitative indicators like budget allocated to employment-killing technologies go up; South Korea is sadly no exception.

AvenueX has been saying this in the last few years now too.

[blbeloved]

Haven’t even gathered the words to describe this beautiful queer movie but Song Lang deserves to be in artistic jewel category

It’s from Vietnam so it is excluded from MDL like most of the movies and dramas from the other socialist countries besides China.

A cynical enforcer and an idealistic cai luong (Vietnamese opera) star cross paths and change their course of life.

My friend Hêvî made a short edit to celebrate them ❤️:

It’s not strictly BL but I’m using the tag because that’s how it might come up if it is searched.

A story of hardship, yearning, alienation, brutality, connection and hope. I recommend it to all who enjoy indulgence in beauty.