do you know Chinese symbolism for homosexuality?
tw homophobia, pedophilia
Hi again, for gay men there are a couple really well known ones but Iâm not sure if they were real or fabricated, because all the articles describing them always cite the same couple sources from Antiquity... I tried to verify them but the only articles that didnât copy and paste from the same source came across as extremely homophobic, so I decided to give up. The most common and reliable one is probably æèą or âcut sleeveâ, which I mentioned in a previous ask. I would like to use this opportunity to talk about some tangential but more important topics regarding homosexuality in China though.
As a followup to my previous ask where I said I'd look through some Ming and Qing novels to see how homosexuality was perceived at the time, the conclusion I (unfortunately) came to was that homophobia was very much alive and well in Chinese literature and society. A lot of people like to argue that gay people fared pretty well in China historically by either pointing to emperors who were or were rumored to be gay or time periods where gay sex was prevalent as a form of consumption. This is extremely shallow and also kind of Orientalist in my opinion, these arguments always go for the emperors and do not take nuance into consideration or dive into wider societal discourses on homosexuality in imperial China. If you research homosexuality in Europe by only looking at royalty, youâll find plenty of homosexual behavior too, does that mean gay people had it very easy in Europe historically?? Not to mention that they usually donât differentiate between dynasties, let alone centuries or decades, even though public opinion on homosexuality in China (or anywhere in the world tbh) could change very quickly. This is also sort of Orientalist, assuming âimperial Chinaâ to be a never changing entity with a never changing stance on homosexuality. Since I know nothing prior to the Ming Dynasty Iâll share some of my random findings on homosexuality and homophobia in the Ming, Qing and 20th century.
Nowadays the symbol of the cut sleeve is just a benign historical allusion but historically it seems that it was used in a negative and condemning sense, implying that people thought of homosexuality as a disease or deviation from the norm. The common phrase used for the cut sleeve is "æèąäčç", usually translated as "the passion of the cut sleeve" nowadays, but the meaning of the word ç here leans more toward "fetish", "obsession" or "hobby" with pathological connotations. I thought maybe this word had a different, nuanced meaning historically but it seems that it was used to describe what it means :(( The only silver lining is probably that with the progression of language it isnât offensive anymore.
In a lot of popular novels from the Ming and Qing, homosexuality was depicted as a "perversion" and a decadent lifestyle that plagues morality, and gay characters were often either killed or straightened out by the end of the story. An example of this is the story é»äčé Huang Jiulang from the series èæćżćŒ Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio by èČæŸéŸ Pu Songling written in the 17th century. In this story, one of the protagonists was gay; he died after confessing his love to the other guy in a very fast paced bury your gays arc which somehow reminded me of the Supernatural finale, and reincarnated as a straight man because of his piety. Thanks I hate it. Pu uses the symbol of the cut sleeve to refer to the protagonist, presumably in a negative manner.
Gayness as power/status symbol
Another thing was that historically in China a lot of people confused homosexuality with pedophilia. This is a global thing, but its presence in China is often overlooked. This could be seen in the popularity of another term for homosexuality, "ćšç«„", meaning something similar to "pederasty". I read somewhere that since the late Ming, pederasty was considered a type of tasteful consumption for high society, along with things like fashion, food, music and art. This was not equivalent to the "cut sleeve" or homosexuality as we know it nowadays, which refers to a personal sexual orientation, pederasty historically often refers to an imbalanced power dynamic where a wealthy, privileged man takes advantage of a young boy as a leisurely activity. Itâs more to show off that someone in a position of privilege and wealth has the power to procure sexual objects, gender and age donât matter much in this regard. I cannot help but cringe violently whenever someone brings up pederasty as proof of Chinaâs historical âopennessâ toward gay people. Talk to me again when in this time and place you could marry someone of your sex (not a minor) and be considered a respectable couple instead of two jerks with a degenerate fetish (not saying that gay people have to marry, itâs just that the ability to do so is an important indicator of equality imo). Pedophilia and homosexuality are not one and the same good heavens.
I hypothesize that the reason why Chinese society was historically homophobic despite having no religious condemnation of homosexual individuals was the idea that having many concubines and male children was a status symbol for men. Women of marriageable age were seen more or less as commodities and male children could supposedly "continue the bloodline" äŒ éŠç« and were vessels for passing down prestige, so having them were of utmost importance to a privileged man. Being just gay or lesbian, however, meant that you didn't perform the "man strong working woman weak making babies" heteronormative family prototype, and was thus prone to criticism. When gay men didnât have children they âcouldnât continue their bloodlineâ and were emasculated, when gay women didnât have children they failed to âfulfill their duties as a womanâ and were shamed.
It kind of makes sense considering how being bisexual was never a problem in comparison, especially for men. If you were a rich guy who had both male and female partners, you would still have children and concubines both male and female so nobody gives a shit. Emperor Zhengde of the Ming (reign 1505-21) was presumably bisexual and had both male and female lovers, nobody had a bone to pick with that; he famously liked to fuck around but those who criticized him did so for his debauchery instead of focusing on the gender of his partners. This is different to homophobia in Europe where same sex attraction was considered evil and immoral in and of itself because of religious reasons, in China it was rather the other practical implications of homosexuality (not having children or a family) that attracted hate.
By the way can we just take a moment to talk about bi erasure in Chinese history. From all accounts of Emperor Zhengde Iâve read he comes across as extremely bisexual, but a lot of people try to make him a gay icon? I mean, he liked women too.
One interesting homophobic angle in ye olde China which I find kind of funny was straight women who wanted to climb the social ladder by marrying rich men talking shit about them after figuring out they were gay lmao. Historically, there were not so many work opportunities for women, so the easiest way to improve social standing was to marry a rich and powerful guy. Not saying that women didn't work, they did but their upward social mobility was restricted because they couldn't enter the imperial examination system which was how men became rich and powerful. This angle is relatively benign and kind of helps illustrate that historical Chinese homophobia was indeed fueled by classism and patriarchy.
I used to think that there were no anti-sodomy statutes in China (laws prohibiting sex between gay men), but it turns out that there was one decree in the Jiajing era (1521-67) and one in 1740, and private gay sex was not actually decriminalized until 1957. Same sex marriage is still not legal in China at time of writing. I couldnât find detailed information on what these laws entailed or how they were enforced, but theyâre enough to prove that homosexuality in China was legally punishable from the 16th century onward. On top of that, even when there was no law prohibiting private sex acts between people of the same sex, displays of gay affection such as kissing or holding hands could still be legally punished under âpublic indecencyâ or âhooliganismâ, which was frequently what happened in the 20th century.Â
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