英语高手来~~~

Gay rights in China

Comrades-in-arms
Jun 18th 2009 | SHANGHAI
From The Economist print edition

The long march out of the closet

AS A boy of 15 in north-eastern China, Dylan Chen knew he was gay. “I grew up thinking I was the only gay person in all of China,” says Mr Chen, now 25 and living in Shanghai. Small wonder. Homosexuality had been decriminalised in China only two years before. It would be officially classified for several years more as a mental illness. Information and acceptance were both in very short supply.

Life for China’s tens of millions of homosexuals has improved markedly since then, especially in big cities. Gay and lesbian bars, clubs, support groups and websites abound. Chinese gays, who playfully call themselves “comrades”, have plenty of scope for networking. One surprising website caters specifically for gays in China’s army and police force.

But even in cosmopolitan Shanghai tolerance has its limits, as Mr Chen and others learned this month when they planned a series of plays, film screenings, panel discussions and parties called Shanghai Pride Week. The organisers, a group of local and expatriate gays, ran into last-minute trouble as city officials forced the cancellation or relocation of some events. Hannah Miller, an American who has lived in Shanghai for five years and was one of the main organisers, knew better than even to think of staging something as brazen as a parade. She hoped that limiting events to private venues and promotional materials to English would be enough to deter unwanted official attention.

In the end eight events went ahead, attended by some 4,000 people, and Ms Miller judged it all a big success. The Chinese press has begun cautiously to report the events, which Mr Chen sees as a big step forward, and a welcome departure from the usual stories about AIDS or the alienation of Chinese homosexuals.

But attitudes will not change easily, especially away from large cities. Traditional values emphasise conventional family life and the continuation of blood lines. The government, meanwhile, has shown a willingness quietly to tolerate homosexuality, but has failed to do much in the way of providing explicit protection. Tentative legislative proposals to expand gay rights have died swift unnoticed deaths. Always wary of rocking the boat, the government routinely quashes attempts at social-activism and rights promotion. Lawyers and activists advocating gay rights have been harassed, and, though many gay websites are accessible, some are blocked.

Very accessible are places like Eddy’s Bar on Shanghai’s west side. A rarity when it opened in 1995, it is now one of the city’s many gay hotspots. This week, apparently undented by the gay-pride kerfuffle, business was brisk.

We
can
become
God,
but
also
when
the
devil,
because
we
attempt
to
resist
the
tide
of
time,
so
that
their
lives
on
the
road
again
to
revive.