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5.0 out of 5 stars
Comrade: r u really as straight as you may think you are?, June 20, 2001
This review is from: Tongzhi: Politics of Same-Sex Eroticism in Chinese Societies (Paperback)
This book is essential reading for anybody who has an interest in the predicament of lesbians and gays in China, including Hong Kong and Taiwan. It should interest any non-Chinese person in a same-sex relationship with a Chinese person. It also has much to say more generally on cross-cultural perspectives on sexuality, and the interaction of global, "Western" values and non-Western "traditional" cultures.
From 1949 in China, "Tongzhi", meaning, roughly "Comrade" was adopted as the egalitarian mode of address between adults in China. In the 1990s, just as it was falling into disuse on the mainland, Hong Kong gay and lesbian activists adopted it, presumably with some degree of irony, as their self-owned term for themselves. This adoption is reminiscent of the reforging of the meaning of the word "gay", but has rather more etymological justification, as the "Tong" already served as the equivalent of the "homo" in "homosexual".
In fact, Chou prefers not to use the words "gay" or "homosexual" in the Chinese context, as his subtitle "Politics of same-sex eroticism in Chinese societies" indicates. Chou identifies a long history of same-sex eroticism within Chinese society, although the historical record is largely confined to men and occurs within the highly hierarchical context of Chinese society. However, the notion of a homosexual (or, presumably, lesbian) sexual identity is a concept imported from the west.
The vectors of this importation were the rise of affective marriage (an incident of "individualism"), Judaeo-Christian attitudes to sex, and, in the twentieth century, medical pathologicization of "deviant" sexuality. Modern Chinese PEPS (Chou's term: an abbreviation for "People erotically attracted to people of the same sex") come up against all three of these.
Same sex erotic preference is no longer consistent with marriage, now (at least ideally) constituted on an affective basis. Resisting marriage, PEPS are exposed as a category of person, a category which missionary religion and medical discourse have until recently labelled as evil or sick respectively. Fear of such exposure, of the shame it will bring to their parents and the hurt which will be caused by their unfilial failure to marry and have children, forces most Chinese PEPS to live lives of circumspection and oppression. The best many can hope for is that their parents will accept their lover as a friend and quasi-sibling, so long as sex never raises its ugly head. Many others will marry and lead a double life.
From the western gay perspective, this just looks like one big closet. We've all been there, done that, been through that. The pressures of familial expectation may be greater, but that is just a difference of degree. Why can't Chinese PEPS just come out of the closet and stand up for their love rights? Sure, it might take time, but it's the only way.
Of course, no one ever really thinks it might be as simple as that, and Chou's book provides many arguments why. He does so by being culturally specific, but doing his valiant best not to be culturally essentialist. Chou is no fan of the "Confucian way", but he does argue clearly why, in the context of a Confucian heritage, rights rhetoric may be ineffective and even, in the (quite long) short term, make things much worse. In mainland China, in particular, Western religious homophobia has never taken root and most people are ignorant or indifferent to the hetero-homo divide. Western style minority politics risks forcing the bulk of the population into the "hetero" camp.
Chou's book is the summation of close to a decade's work, much of it previously published in Chinese in Hong Kong where he has been a Tongzhi activist.
The book commences with an historical introduction, sketching the historical absence of "hetero-homo duality" in Chinese culture, and the death of cultural tolerance for same sex eroticism in the twentieth century.
The second section deals with the recent past in Hong Kong, China and Taiwan respectively. Chou's account is informed by a wealth of interview material from Hong Kong and the PRC: he admits that he had initially asked another author to write the chapter on Taiwan but was obliged to complete that chapter himself. As a result, it lacks the wealth of first-hand information that the other sections have, and concentrates more on the public record.
The third section examines two specific aspects of PEPS life in Hong Kong: the "rice-queen/potato queen" scene between "Caucasians" and Chinese, and the "tomboy-tomboy-girl" scene (mannish girls and their girlfriends). In these and the other Hong Kong chapter, Chou has much to say about Hong Kong's colonial relationship first with Britain and now with Beijing. Chou's picture of the expatriate "rice queen" is far from flattering, although he ultimately appears to conclude that such terms are demeaning to both parties.
The fourth section of the book deals with strategies for change. Chou prefers a strategy of "queering the straight": asking society at large "are you really as straight as you may think you are?". "Now tongzhi invite everyone, irrespective of their sexual orientation, to join them in exploring their own sexual desire."
In the light of all the material collected in this book, particularly concerning mainland China, this seems hopelessly utopian to me, though I would not presume to propose any other course myself. It is certainly food for thought.
This is an excellent book. Few matters have escaped Chou's attention. Class and age issues are not dodged. Where sometimes I might have wished for a different emphasis, this is normally because I am looking for a comparison to the West which it is not Chou's task to undertake. For instance, more might have been said about the gender separatism of traditional society and China's different codes for same-sex physical intimacy which falls short of sex. Equally, although Chou admits that historical same sex eroticism was classist and sexist, he might have said a bit more about the continued capacity for male Chinese PEPS who are married to do as they please: a capacity which wives could rarely match.
The book is well produced, edited and indexed,with an extensive bibliography. It is a shame thepublishers could not run to Chinese characters or tone markings above the pinyin.
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