By The Associated Press
09.14.2009 3:40pm EDT
(Guangzhou, China)
When the police descend on People’s Park and shoo away the gay men gathered
there, the men usually scatter to avoid trouble. But recently, about 50 or so
confronted five officers who began a sweep and finally forced a police retreat
after a heated but nonviolent standoff.
Though mostly ignored
by state-run media, news of the incident in the southern city of Guangzhou -
also known as Canton - spread quickly on the Internet and became a hot topic in
gay chat forums nationwide. Some in China’s gay community see it as a sign of a
new sense of empowerment and a burgeoning awareness of their rights. Members of the
community have had minor confrontations with the authorities before in other
cities. But usually the disputes play out in a low-key way, without much
resistance to sweeps, said Lu Jun, founder of a Beijing-based group that fights
discrimination against people with hepatitis B. “I’ve never heard of
something like this happening anywhere else,” Lu said about the Guangzhou
incident. “I think what happened marks great progress for homosexuals.” Gay activist Dao Dao
in Shanghai also applauded those in Guangzhou for standing up for their rights.
But he said he doubted it was the right long-term strategy. He favors striving
for wider acceptance by being model citizens, rather than being outspoken and
confrontational. “We don’t do any harm
to the society. I think that’s the best way to show all the people that we are
good people and nothing different,” said Dao Dao, who works in finance and also
helps organize gay parties, sporting events and other activities. Gay rights have come a
long way since the years just after the 1949 communist revolution when
homosexuality was considered a disease from the decadent West and feudal
societies, and gay people were persecuted. China waited until 1997 to
decriminalize sodomy. Homosexuality was finally removed from the official list
of mental disorders in 2001. But still, there are no widely accepted estimates
of the number of gay people in China. This year has already
been an eventful one for gay rights. In June, the first gay pride festival was
held in Shanghai, the nation’s commercial capital. Later in the month, the
five-day Beijing Queer Film Festival was held - an event that police blocked in
2001 and 2005. But as those cities
showed signs of being more tolerant, Guangzhou authorities were starting to
crack down in People’s Park - a shady oasis of trees and gazebos in the middle
of the muggy, traffic-congested city. The park is popular with youngsters who
play badminton or retirees practicing their ballroom-dancing moves to stereos
blasting out tunes like “Sukiyaki,” the Japanese ballad that became a hit in
the U.S. in the 1960s. For years, the park
has also been a favorite hangout for gay men, especially among the young or
working-class who can’t afford the bars and restaurants around town that cater
to the community. The men - many dressed in tank tops and tight jeans - stroll
around the park or sit together on a long line of stone benches. Nearby is a
public restroom, where some men have sex - a source of much of the friction
with the police. On Aug, 25, the police
moved in. “They told us, ‘You just leave and don’t come back. This is People’s
Park, not Homosexual Park,’” said Xiao, the AIDS activist, who is a short and
thin and wears large black-framed glasses. “That made me extremely mad. He was
saying gays aren’t human.” Xiao said several men
quietly walked away, but he stood his ground and people gathered around as he
argued with police. Some who left wandered back after a few minutes, and Xiao
estimated the crowd swelled to about 100 people, including several heterosexual
passers-by who supported him. The police declined to
be interviewed. An officer at the front desk of the neighborhood’s main police
station grew agitated when asked about the incident, and with a loud voice he
ordered an Associated Press reporter to leave the station. A park policeman, who
declined to give his name because he’s not authorized to speak to the media,
denied the police were unfair or discriminating against gays. “The problem is that
they do things in the public bathroom. Some of them will grope each other on
the park benches,” the policeman said. “People see them doing these things and
it makes them feel uncomfortable. Then they call the police.” The officer added that
those who have been asked to leave the park or have been taken to the station
for questioning are repeat offenders who constantly cause trouble. But gay activist Ah
Qiang disagrees with the police. He said in March police started rounding up
random groups of men in the park. They were marched to the police station where
they would be forced to write a statement about their activities before being
released without being charged, he said. Police often called
the men “gay lao” or “ji lao” - a pejorative term in the local Cantonese
dialect, he said. However, the activist
acknowledged that some people do misbehave in public. But he added, “The police
should deal with individual cases. They shouldn’t punish a whole group of
people.” There’s a deep
division within the gay community about who is to blame. Shi Heng, a gay hotel
worker who hangs out at the park, found himself in the middle of a fierce
debate with younger men during a recent afternoon when he insisted that the
cause of the trouble is the men who have sex in the restrooms. “People are being too
crude. We simply can’t behave like this in a public place,” said the
47-year-old man. But another man in his
20s disagreed with Shi and said young men like him had few options. “We can’t afford to
rent a room, and many of us live with our parents,” said the man, who declined
to be named because he feared it would cause trouble at home and work. “Where
are we supposed to have sex?”