Kids really do say the darndest things! We almost fell off our chair watching this vlog. Basically this 16 year old gay expat teen in Shanghai has just come out to his parents and he decided to share his story with the world on Youtube. After telling his mother on Tuesday over Skype, Zach was half expecting to get a good lynching, as all gay teens do when they come out. What he got was......

Shanghai LGBT keeps the faggotry alive in the city with its second annual drag party hosted at Shanghai Studio on Sept 20. Star of the night, once again, was Shanghai's favourite drag queen, Gwen de Tempe, who is also now City Weekend's LGBeaT columnist. For the pictures to last year's party, click here. Have you hosted a great party and got fabulous pictures to share? Get in touch with us at info AT shanghaiist DOT......

Fudan University, frequently ranked the 3rd best university in China, just kicked-off their fall session of “Homosexual Health and Social Science” on September 16th. When it commenced in 2003, there was just 1 student officially enrolled, but standing room only in the actual class. What a surprise! These days, the course is sponsored by the prestigious Ford Foundation and has an impressive list of lecturers from various walks of life including multinationals like Citigroup, the......

While dancing at the city’s newest gay nightspot, D2, our friends decided that pre-club etiquette in Shanghai is subpar and a little lesson from Miss Manners is in order. Feel free to add anything we missed in the comments section… Rules for Clubbers to Live By 1. Take a shower before you start your evening out on the town. 2. Brush your teeth. An important one in a country where rumor has it only 1......

The Independent has named Shanghai as one of the world's five most improved places for gay tolerance. The other four cities named were New Delhi, Tel Aviv, Cape Town and Havana. [Source]......

The latest episode of Queer As Folk Beijing, China's first independent gay video podcast, discusses homophobia in China today. Parts 2 and 3 of the show after the jump.......

Paralympics - changing attitudes in China [Radio Netherlands] "It's money well spent, but China's own 83 million disabled people no doubt find it more important not to be discriminated against any more by the rest of society, or to be stared at as if they were circus freaks."Woman who stripped during Paralympic opening mentally ill [AFP] "A woman who burst into the Beijing Paralympics opening ceremony and tried to remove her clothes was mentally ill,......

Ok, so here's a bit of Shanghai nightlife gossip for you. The Bund (or at least close to the Bund) is going gay this Saturday, September 6 with the soft opening of a new gay mega-club called Club D2 (perhaps a tribute the sorely mourned Club Deep). The gay community is no doubt rejoicing about this as we're sick of hearing the moaning about Shanghai not having a good gay club these days. Lounge 18......

In honor of the Beijing Olympics, Shanghai’s #1 fag hag scoured the city for info on gay sports. Everyone knows a large gay contingent can be found daily at our most popular gyms. However, did you realize Shanghai also hosts gay swimming (we’re sure Michael Phelps or Zhang Lin are welcome), badminton, table tennis, volleyball and even kungfu! Rainbow League is the fantastic association that organizes many of the gay sports clubs in Shanghai (more......

Jim Buzinski of Outsports.com reports that out of the record 10,708 athletes attending the Beijing Olympics, only 10 of them are openly gay — and all of them are women except for Australian diver Matthew Mitcham. The nine out women are: Judith Arndt (Germany, cycling), Imke Duplitzer (Germany, fencing), Gro Hammerseng and Katja Nyberg (Norway, handball and a lesbian couple), Natasha Kai (U.S., soccer), Lauren Lappin (U.S., softball); Victoria "Vickan" Svensson (Sweden, soccer); Rennae Stubbs......

Following on from the story of a straight couple's clinch on the metro in January, the latest video doing the Chinese internet rounds is an all-girl couple getting frisky on line 2. In an attempt to justify this blatant voyeurism, we would say that we find the online reaction (as translated by ChinaSmack), to be the relevant and fairly positive aspect of this story:"If this happened everyday on Shanghai’s metro, Shanghai’s would no longer have......

Just like the American soap opera, As the World Turns, the Planet Gay Shanghai has experienced numerous plot twists in the past year. Shanghai’s #1 Fag Hag has been out of the scene for a long time, but she's just had a fabulous relaunch of her career and here’s her summary of what's happened over the last year for the benefit of you newbies in town... • Club Deep closes and thousands, or at least......

A Date With Lu Yu《鲁豫有约》is one of the most influential talkshows in China which has been known to constantly push the envelope and to broach topics previously considered too hot to touch. One such episode is the one below which features two homosexual men from the Sichuan Province — who, long before the word "gay" had entered the Chinese lexicon — married each other, adopted a son and have been together for 21 years. VIDEO......

The Shanghai Fag Hag is back! After an extended and highly enjoyable break from China, we have returned, just in time for the release of Li Yinhe's (our personal, sexologist hero!) Homosexuality Survey. Peijin Chen, has done an awesome translation of the survey on his blog, but we'll give you a few highlights. Not to give it all away, but this fairy queen found the answers surprisingly enlightened:When asked if they thought heterosexuals and homosexuals......

The Sichuan earthquake caused such a large number of Chinese people to step out and donate blood that mobile blood donation buses around the nation had to stop accepting donations because more has been given than needed. Several lesbians were unhappy though when told their blood would not be accepted because of a blanket ban on blood donation by homosexuals by the Ministry of Health under the Blood Donor Health Check Requirements 《供血者健康检查标准》. Para 6.16......

Since the time we told you about Shirley Phelps-Roper's email to China Daily columnist Raymond Zhou, everybody's favourite church, the Westboro Baptist Church has completely revamped its official website GodHatesFags.com (check it out — it actually is looking kinda swanky now). Looking through the site, we found this press release sent out in late January, when China was suffering its worst winter storm in 50 years, praising the Lord for "punishing" China — "that evil......

The following update from Beijing-based AIDS activist Wan Yanhai (万延海) is currently being circulated among gay and other AIDS-related online groups (proxy/VPN required) on the mainland:Account of police raids targeted at LGBT in Beijing Wan Yanhai First instance: in the second half of January 2008, the police in Chaoyang District visited the residence of a LGBT activist. They enquired about her ex-roommate residence permit, asked for her picture, and enquired about the nature of her......

All this month (that would be March), the photography of Hong Kong artist Norm Yip will be on display not on the walls of a fancy-schmancy gallery on Moganshan Road, but on the meandering walls of Shanghai Studio. The photography, in mostly black and white, features fit, mostly East Asian men in various stages of undress, in front of simple backgrounds or stark black backdrops. The pictures do not feature any naughty bits, so Mr.......

Photo by Peijin Chen Sexually transmitted diseases on the rise Reuters: China reports rise in sexually transmitted diseases Independent: China admits that cases of HIV/Aids have risen 45 per cent AFP: China launches first anti-AIDS drive for gay men: state media Religion AP: China Official Explains Religion Policy The Hindu: China for conditional constructive dialogue with Vatican Christian Today: Miliband should raise religious freedom in China visit – CSW The environment Reuters: Top China......

With all the bad press surrounding Steven Spielberg's Olympic boycott, Beijing seems to be scrambling to action to diffuse all the negative publicity by wooing a most unlikely target, the Pope. From Michael Sheridan of the Sunday Times (UK):TEMPTED by the prize of a historic visit to China by Pope Benedict XVI, the nation’s leaders have authorised a renewed effort in confidential discussions with the Vatican to heal their rift and inaugurate diplomatic ties. The......

By Jake in Shanghai Chinese New Year around the world Reuters: Chinese New Year exodus exposes Singapore generation gap AFP: Brown sends New Year wishes to China Xinhua: Chinese new year goods sold in Mexico's Chinatown AllAfrica.com: Botswana: Chinese Celebrate New Year The Canadian Press: Chinese New Year banquets being held more frequently in restaurants Xinhua: Danish PM wishes for closer cooperation with China in New Year HIV/AIDS China Daily: Charting the battle against......

Gay China seen through the eyes of three different media this week China Daily has an interview of two gay men and a lesbian that also features a big, bold picture of two young men kissing in Beijing. The first story of a 57 year old married man caught our attention:Tong Ge was married to a woman for more than 20 years, and has raised a son. But Tong is gay. "If I could turn......

In a recent blog entry, leading sexologist-sociologist Li Yinhe (李银河) has voiced her thoughts on recent porn crackdowns [h/t to Global Voices, translation by Shanghaiist]: 今天在中央12台看到打击淫秽网站的报道，不像看到破获谋杀、盗窃或性侵害的报道那样觉得毫无问题。 Today I saw reports on CCTV-12 related to the crackdown on porn sites. And unlike other reports on murder, theft, and sexual crimes, I thought there was a problem with these reports. 公安人员的侦破非常努力，法律部门的审判严肃认真，他们执法的依据也非常明确：刑法关于打击淫秽品的传播和禁止组织色情表演的条款。 The public security guys work very hard on the crackdown, and the justice department has issued......

2007 was a great year for Shanghai's LGBT community. Brimming with events and parties that forced us to dig up photographic evidence to remember, the one-year old and 650+ member ShanghaiLGBT group really got into its stride this year, organizing events for all of the crazy and diverse characters in the group. The growth of the LGBT community in Shanghai was evident at this year's second annual LGBT Pub Crawl, where people were turned away......

From Danwei: In this episode of Danwei TV's 'The Shanghai Beat', host Adam Schokora meets up with Sean Leow and B6, co-founders of the Neocha.com. The video ends with a performance by Shanghainese indie-pop trio Hard Queen. Also on Shanghaiist Yet another Gay Shanghai video NeoCha and Neospring Creative Festival Are you creating quality fresh, informative and entertaining videos about Shanghai or elsewhere in China? Email us at info at shanghaiist.com and we can discuss......

Yet more news on China's HIV/AIDS situation, and this time from a most unlikely source. Did you know, dear readers, that Naked News, the "program with nothing to hide" that has its news anchors strip as they read the news, has male strippers newsreaders too? Apparently this program is targetted mainly towards the gay market (which makes us wonder if the program will ever have a market among women)? We were surprised to learn that......

The Red Laowai (红老外) — yes, that shirtless dude in New York that's been singing communist propaganda songs such as “My China Heart"《我的中国心》, "Without the Communist Party, there is no New China"《没有共产党就没有新中国》and "Oriental Red"《东方红》and putting his videos online — has done it again. This time, he has put his shirt on, created a music video and he's singing Jay Chou and rapping. The song 止战之殇 (The Wound That Ends War) is an anti-war song in......

EastSouthWestNorth has translated an excellent story on the translation crisis in China that first appeared in Phoenix Weekly. It talks about the more than 1,000 foreign literary works that are translated and published in China each year (and we assume that number is still growing). The story laments over the "awfulness of the translations, the crudeness of the translators and the absence of critical reflection on what is happening". It then looks into why translation......

The Ministry of Health will soon relax a 14 year old rule that bars foreigners with HIV/AIDS from entering China, although a date has not yet been set, reports the Associated Press. Needless to say, this is of MAJOR significance. As everyone who is employed in China on a work visa (and we're referring to the 'Z' visa, not the 'F') will know, if you are found to have the HIV during your health check,......

It must be really in vogue to shoot videos on Gay Shanghai now. Just last week, we showed you one that was shot by Adam Schokora for Danwei TV. Earlier this year, we told you about a slew of Chinese online gay TV shows, including 同志亦凡人 or Queer As Folk (in English) which featured a Gay Shanghai segment as well. And why would anyone doing a TV program on Gay China not want to come......