All men in the realm followed this fashion to the extent that husbands and wives were estranged. Writings from the Liu Song Dynasty claimed that homosexuality was as common as heterosexuality in the late 3rd century:Īll the gentlemen and officials esteemed it. Ming Dynasty literature, such as Bian Er Chai ( 弁而釵/弁而钗), portrays homosexual relationships between men as enjoyable relationships.
However, critics have cited the fact that the relationship ended in tragedy and violence to argue that the story was therefore critical rather than supportive of homosexual relationships. The story of Dong Xian, which details the same-sex relationship between Emperor Ai of Han and one of his male concubines has been cited by Hinsch as evidence of the historical tolerance of homosexuality within the Chinese empire. These slang terms are also commonly used in mainland China now. These two terms are abbreviations of the transliteration of the English term "lesbian". Lesbians usually call themselves lazi ( 拉子 lāzi) or lala ( 拉拉, pinyin: lālā). Datong is short for daxuesheng tongzhi (university students homosexuals). Among gay university students, the acronym " datong" ( 大同 dàtóng ' great togetherness'), which also refers to utopia, in Chinese is becoming popular. Another slang term is boli ( 玻璃 bōli 'crystal or glass'), which is not so commonly used. "Gay" is sometimes considered to be offensive when used by heterosexuals or even by homosexuals in certain situations. In Cantonese, gei1 ( 基), adopted from English gay, is used. However, in mainland China, tongzhi is used both in the context of the traditional "comrade" sense (e.g., used in speeches by Chinese Communist Party officials) and to refer to homosexuals. 'comrade' sometimes along with nü tongzhi, 女同志 nǚ tóngzhì 'female comrade'), which was first adopted by Hong Kong researchers in Gender Studies, is used as slang in Mandarin Chinese to refer to homosexuals. Instead of that formal word, " tongzhi" ( 同志 tóngzhì), simply a head rhyme word, is more commonly used in the gay community. The formal modern word for "homosexuality/homosexual(s)" is tongxinglian ( 同性戀 tóngxìngliàn 'same-sex relations/love') or tongxinglian zhe ( 同性戀者 tóngxìngliàn zhě, homosexual people). Other, less literary, terms have included "male trend" ( 男風 nánfēng), "allied brothers" ( 香火兄弟 xiānghuǒ xiōngdì), and "the passion of Longyang" ( 龍陽癖 lóngyángpǐ), referencing a homoerotic anecdote about Lord Long Yang in the Warring States period. She dawdles, not daring to move closer, / Afraid he might compare her with leftover peach. An example of the latter term appears in a 6th-century poem by Liu Xiaozhuo: Traditional terms for homosexuality included " the passion of the cut sleeve" ( Chinese: 斷袖之癖 pinyin: duànxiù zhī pǐ), and "the divided peach" ( Chinese: 分桃 pinyin: fēntáo). 7 Slang in contemporary Chinese gay culture.
4 Gay, lesbian and queer culture in contemporary mainland China.Yet, in 2021 Weibo censored the accounts of numerous LGBT student organizations without any prior warning. There was a step forward for the China LGBT community after the Weibo incident in April 2018, where the public outcry over the platform for banning homosexual content led the platform to withdraw the decision. 18% of men surveyed answered they had come out to their families, while around 80% were reluctant due to family pressure. A third of the men surveyed, as well as 9% of the women surveyed said they were in the closet about their sexuality. In a survey by the organization WorkForLGBT of 18,650 lesbians, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people, 3% of males and 6% of females surveyed described themselves as "completely out". įor most of the 20th century, homosexual sex was banned in the People's Republic of China until it was legalized in 1997. On the other hand, Gulik's study argued that the Mongol Yuan dynasty introduced a more ascetic attitude to sexuality in general. Opposition to homosexuality, according to the study by Hinsch, did not become firmly established in China until the 19th and 20th centuries through the Westernization efforts of the late Qing Dynasty and early Republic of China. Several early Chinese emperors are speculated to have had homosexual relationships accompanied by heterosexual ones. According to one study, for some time after the fall of the Han Dynasty, homosexuality was widely accepted in China but this has been disputed.
Homosexuality has been documented in China since ancient times.