Censorship

Extensive censorship expressly prohibiting information and images relating to homosexuality has been in place in mainland China (UNDP 2010: 61). Chinese gay movies, such as Farewell My Concubine, East Palace West Palace and Lanyu, are not shown in theatres; and the US film Brokeback Mountain was not screened, although pirated copies were easy to obtain. The government-owned English-language China Daily, however, has included positive coverage of sexual orientation issues. There is also regular Chinese-language online video programming, notably by a sophisticated production group called Queer Comrades. Some of their programs and documentaries are available on DVDs. Chinese language gay male magazines are produced in Beijing, Hong Kong and Taiwan. These have been hard to find in China, but are fairly easily available now in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

There was a boom in gay and lesbian literature in Taiwan in the 1990s (Martin 2003: 22). The owner of the only LGBT bookstore in Taiwan was prosecuted. Ho refers to the 2003 seizure and confiscation of gay pictorial publications from the bookstore and, despite persistent gay demonstrations and protestation, the consequent indictment and sentencing of its owner in the following year (Ho 2010: 540).

In 2006, Radio Television Hong Kong ran ‘Gay Lovers’ on their regular program Hong Kong Connection. It featured an interview with a lesbian couple who supported marriage rights and a gay man who called for anti-discrimination legislation. In January 2007 the HK SAR Broadcasting Authority warned Radio Television Hong Kong that the program was biased in favour ofhomosexuality. Some 20 gay and gay-friendly organisations and individuals protested the Broadcast Authority’s ruling. A panel of the Legislative Council in March 2007 unanimously condemned the ruling (Hui 2007). A gay activist sued the Authority, arguing it had breached the Hong Kong Bill of Rights. In 2008 the Hong Kong High Court ruled against the broad­casting authority. In his decision, Mr. Justice Hartmann said that all legislation referring to sexuality must be deemed also to refer to sexual orientation (Cho Man Kit v Broadcasting Authority 2008).

The South Korean Youth Protection Law of 1997 was designed to check the distribution of harmful media materials and drugs to young people under 19 (Sanders 2012). Under the law, a list of ‘harmful’ matters included ‘things promoting perverted sexual acts such as bestiality, group sex, incest, homosexuality, sadomasochism’. The Commission on Youth Protection developed a list of 120,000 websites that were to be banned, including those of Advocate magazine, the International Lesbian and Gay Association, gaytoronto and gayvancouver. In 2001, the government blocked access to Exzone, the oldest Korean gay website, for schools, libraries, state offices and cybercafes, although Koreans could access the site from home computers. Other local web sites were also affected. Over 20 Korean LGBT organisations joined together to protest the censorship, forming the Lesbian and Gay Alliance against Discrimination. A public protest was held outside Myeong Dong Catholic Cathedral, a famous site for strikers in Seoul. For 60 days individuals carried out serial one-day hunger strikes. Most protestors were non-gay activists, members of the NGO Free Online. Amnesty International condemned the censorship and the Lesbian and Gay Alliance against Discrimination coalition began a court challenge (Kim 2002). A judge upheld the censorship of Exzone in August 2002 but the National Human Rights Commission of Korea reviewed the issue and concluded that the censorship was a violation of human rights. This decision was not binding on the government, but the government accepted the Commission’s conclusions and the blanket censorship ended.

Hundreds ofgay, lesbian and trans books, magazines and videos are available in gay bookstores in the Shinjuku ni-chome area of Tokyo. Japanese censorship laws prohibit only graphic depictions of genitalia and penetrative sexual acts, but do not discriminate on the grounds of the sex or gender of the persons depicted. ‘boys’ love’ (BL) is a genre of Japanese manga (comic books) popular with girls and young women featuring stories of male-male romance. BL is popular in countries throughout Asia but was recently the object of a crackdown in mainland China. In 2010 conservative Ishihara Shintaro, then governor of Tokyo, used local zoning laws in the Tokyo Metropolitan Area in an attempt to limit the distribution of manga titles that he considered ‘harmful to youth’ (McLelland 2011).

Updated: 02.11.2015 — 11:23