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Up until yesterday, it'd been smooth sailing for Shanghai's first Pride week. But as of Wednesday afternoon, the festival, a celebration of gay pride and social tolerance, ran into some problems with the authorities. Officials from a Shanghai commercial bureau visited and warned the owners of two venues that they would face "severe consequences" if they failed to cancel the events that were to be held there.
At 4pm on Wednesday, officials visited Kathleen's 5, which had plans for two film screenings, and ordered them to cancel the events because they lacked the proper film screening license. The films they'd intended to show were "s/he," about a young girl's sexual identity crisis, and "Destination Shanghai," about the city's sex trade.
Jeffrey Tang, the event manager of Kathleen's 5, was there when the officials from Shanghai Industry & Commercial Administration Bureau arrived yesterday. "They told us the reason for the cancellation is that we don't have any entertainment licence, which is true, but we have never had any problems with cancellations before. Although, we have never screened any movies before, we've had corporate and business events, and also DJ's playing," said Tang. When asked if this was related to the Chinese authorities' sensitivity regarding LGBT issues, Tang replied, "Of course it's somehow related. China has too many laws, and people often go around them. The police often choose not to use the law, but if there's something they don't like, they choose to use it."
Similarly, authorities visited Barefoot Studios, which was supposed to host the "The Laramie Project," a play about gay hate crimes in small town America—and told warned them not to hold the event. Furthermore, one of today's Pride events, the Open Bar at Shanghai Studio, was also canceled, though organizers say this was the venue's own decision.
Despite these cancellations and setbacks and the associated jitters, much of the show will go on. The organizers are busy finding new venues for some of the cancelled events. Co-organizer Hannah Miller tells us that The Laramie Project will find a new venue and run next Friday instead. Of all these setbacks and minor brushes with the authorities, Miller said "of course we're disappointed, but it's true we didn't have a license. But the overall feeling is still positive and we're still feeling optimistic. We'll wait and see how the rest of the week goes."
Shanghaiist tried to get in contact with both commercial bureaus who cancelled the events to hear their side of the story, but apparently "no one who knows anything about this is here today."
You can also read other links to this story from the BBC and the Shanghai Daily.
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If this was a legitimate government, you guys could be looking for the authorities from the commercial bureau behind the closing, and even get to work at removing them from office.
It looks like the authorities got around to deleting the article from Shanghai Daily, although there remains a front-page piece about a parrot that steals passports.
YES!!! Yes!!! I knew this would happen! I knew it I knew it!!! Why do people keep coming to China and trying to force a different forcibly?
Just remember "You don't change China. China changes you". Remember that remember that.
I meant "force a different lifestyle"
shstormsrooper: China changes you? How so? You mean it makes all the gay homosexuals into straight boys?
shstormstrooper: you are so right! China was so much better before it interacted with the larger world. I mean look at what Buddhism and tomatoes, peppers and potatoes, and Sun Yatsed did to China!!!?? Really terrible stuff! Of Course China, changes the things that arrive there; this is the best part! Welcome it.
China definitely changes people, it turns most normal westerners into twisted degenerates who can no longer function normally in western society after 5-6 years, especially those foreigners who "do business" in China.
So what's your excuse? You seem to be the most maladjusted.
The Shanghai Daily piece is no longer online. Are the censors now trying to hush it up? Here's what I have from my cache:
Gay pride fest runs afoul of city authorities
THE organizers of Shanghai's first gay pride festival started off the week believing that the city was willing to tolerate a more open attitude toward homosexuality.
Last night, it seemed their optimism may have been premature.
After a story on the festival appeared on the front page of a Beijing-based newspaper yesterday, local authorities shut down three of the planned events.
Two of the cancelled events were film screenings at the Kathleen 5 bar and restaurant and the other was a play at Barefoot Studios, a photography studio.
Authorities said the reason for the shutdowns was that the venues lacked the appropriate licenses, Hannah Miller, chief organizer of the festival, told Shanghai Daily last night.
According to Miller, a Mr Yao from the Nanjing Road E. Commercial Bureau told Kathleen 5 that if the showing went ahead, "penalties would be severe." The films were scheduled for last night and tomorrow evening.
A Mr. Li from an unidentified local authority told Barefoot Studios that it did not have a licence to stage plays, and tomorrow night's production was suspended. Organizers are now looking for venues with an appropriate license to host the play.
The films that were to be shown were "s/he," which is about a young girl's sexual identity crisis, and "Destination Shanghai," about the city's sex trade. The play, "The Laramie Project," deals with a gay-related hate crime in small-town America.
The festival, which opened last Sunday, was meant to celebrate the increasing visibility and tolerance of the gay community in China.
"We want to bridge the gap between gay and straight, expat and Chinese," Miller said.
And until yesterday afternoon there had been no intervention from authorities. Although organizers had not sought official approval for the festival, they had been confident that the events including talks, films and parties at private venues would not run into trouble.
"They are all activities we have hosted before, and we never had problems. This time we just put the events together in a week and gave it the name of a festival," Miller said.
But from the outset, the organizers were not confident enough to schedule a parade, which is common in the gay pride festivals elsewhere in the world that are going on now. After consulting legal counsel they felt it would push official boundaries too far.
Miller said she could not comment on the reasons for the shutdowns, or on the possibility of similar action affecting the rest of the festival.
All other events, including a day-long series of parties this Saturday expected to attract more than 1,000 people, are going ahead as planned. The main event is scheduled for the Glamour Bar, on the Bund. And a "Queer Olympiad" is scheduled for the festival's closing day on Sunday.
Did the community actually think the government would be a new, improved and enlightened one?? Please. This micro situation in the big picture only magnifies how truly neurotic, insecure and threatened the CCP feels about anything that might lead to a "movement".
Sorry Shanghai people (esp you love-to-assimilate lao wais) but what were you thinking? Shanghai an Asian financial hub? Shanghai a cultural beacon? Shanghai the center of East Asia Gay Pride?? Time to re-tune your receivers.
Now that the air has been shot out from your harmless, innocuous balloon, its time to reassess that utopia on the Yangtze you all live in...
@LoveChinaLongTime: So we should all just sit around and do nothing, is what you're saying?
This affair is simply a reflection of what we already know about China - that everything is vague and definitive and straight answers are rare at best.
It also demonstrates the many faces of China. Yesterday's China Daily had a front page article praising the event as a sign of China's "social progress." But this newspaper is aimed at an international audience. In other words, the stories contained within it are propaganda aimed at presenting China in a positive light. It wants the international community to see China as open and progressive.
But, in real-life everyday China, was the pride festival trumpeted in such a way in the local Chinese press? I doubt it was even mentioned. Despite apparent top-level approval of the event (re China Daily coverage) at ground level in Shanghai local prejudices still pertain.
The closure of these gay events is a reminder that, no matter how far Shanghai has progressed, it still has a long way to go in terms of evolving socially and throwing off feudal ideas that belong in the previous century.
Feudal ideas from the previous century? Riiiiight. Shanghai has applied alot of ideas from Western cultures to improve it's standard of living, there no doubt China is a better place with the aid of Western influence.
But please tell me how letting the People of China know more about lesbian and man love advance them further? Oh please let me hear your arguement about how sticking a penis up man's bumhole or a vagina against vagina rubbing session will help "harmonise" and advance China's way of thinking. Please please, do let me know :)
I eagerly wait for your reply on that.
@shstormtrooper: for 51 weeks in the year Chinese gays and lesbians have to live in a society where people tell them that there is something wrong with them. I've talked to gays here who've told me their parents have disowned them after finding out their orientation. Can you imagine what it would be like if your parents disowned you?
The purpose of Pride Week is to give them 1 week out of the year so that they can be around others like themselves, so they can experience a little bit of the acceptance the rest of us take for granted. In what way does giving them that week hurt anyone?
Orifice preference has nothing to do with it. Neither is it about why China should take in more "Western" ideas. Accepting homosexuality shouldn't been seen as "Western influence" its just a matter of leaving old prejudices behind and accepting different lifestyles and ways of thinking... that can only be good for any country. At any rate, the west is not that far ahead from China on this front anyway.
While I am not surprised, I have always thought it was silly that the Chinese government does not go easier on gay people. With the gender imbalance being what it is, and with the problem only set to get worse because altering it would mean admitting that the huge "success" that is the family planning policy has some nasty side effects, it makes sense to turn a blind eye to gay events. The more Chinese men who like each other, the fewer there will be who think they must find brides :-D.
how shocking! in such a free society! we're still on in SF by the way :P