{"id":2541,"date":"2025-07-11T21:25:59","date_gmt":"2025-07-11T21:25:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/china-cracks-down-on-women-writing-gay-erotica-some-face-up-to-10-years-in-jail\/"},"modified":"2025-07-11T21:25:59","modified_gmt":"2025-07-11T21:25:59","slug":"china-cracks-down-on-women-writing-gay-erotica-some-face-up-to-10-years-in-jail","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jobuzo.com\/en\/china-cracks-down-on-women-writing-gay-erotica-some-face-up-to-10-years-in-jail\/","title":{"rendered":"China cracks down on women writing gay erotica, some face up to 10 years in jail"},"content":{"rendered":"
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BEIJING, July 11 — Chinese women who publish homoerotica online say they are being threatened with fines and jail time, as increasing enforcement of vague obscenity charges targets a rare space for LGBTQ identity and feminism.<\/p>\n

In recent months, Chinese police have detained dozens of writers on Haitang Literature City, a Taiwan-based website known for publishing serialised Boys’ Love, a genre of erotic fiction mainly written and read by heterosexual women.<\/p>\n

Originating as a strand of Japanese manga comics in the 1960s known as “yaoi”, the genre has attracted a cult following in Asia and beyond, leading to popular screen adaptations and web series.<\/p>\n

The stories defy social stereotypes about the roles of men and women, a 22-year-old writer who asked to go by the pseudonym Miu Miu, told AFP.<\/p>\n

“It’s a kind of resistance… resisting a male-dominated society,” she said.<\/p>\n

The latest crackdown ensnared mostly amateur writers who earned little to nothing for their work.<\/p>\n

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Under Chinese law, profiting from “spreading obscene content” can lead to fines and prison.<\/p>\n

“Serious” instances can carry jail terms of up to a decade.<\/p>\n

The obscenity law applies when someone’s work gets at least 10,000 clicks or is “used” to collect fees exceeding 10,000 yuan (RM5,935).<\/p>\n

While the law excludes “artistic works or works of artistic value”, that distinction is usually left to police.<\/p>\n

“The rules are outdated,” said a lawyer representing one of the authors and who asked not to be named due to the risk of repercussions.<\/p>\n

“The general public’s attitude towards sex is no longer the same as it was 30 or 40 years ago,” the lawyer added.<\/p>\n

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One author phoned by police earned 2,000 yuan for two books with a total of 72 chapters that, combined, drew around 100,000 clicks.<\/p>\n

“Are there really 100,000 people who have seen my work like they said? Are they really going to sentence me to three to five years?” the author wrote on Weibo.<\/p>\n

“Don’t they know how precious three to five years of life are?”<\/p>\n

Censors without borders<\/strong><\/p>\n

The investigations have also renewed criticism of a practice known as “distant water fishing”, cross-provincial policing by cash-strapped local governments.<\/p>\n

The profit-driven enforcement typically involves authorities travelling to another jurisdiction and seizing a suspect’s assets.<\/p>\n

“Police find this kind of stuff can make them money,” Liang Ge, a lecturer on digital sociology at University College London, said of the targeting of Boys’ Love authors.<\/p>\n

In one case, a policeman from northwestern Lanzhou travelled 2,000 kilometres (more than 1,200 miles) to investigate a writer in her coastal hometown.<\/p>\n

She was driven to the police station and questioned for hours about her writing.<\/p>\n

She is currently on bail but could face criminal charges, which would disqualify her from taking China’s civil service exam and positions in some hospitals and schools.<\/p>\n

Another 20-year-old author received a police summons which prompted her to travel hundreds of miles from the city of Chongqing to Lanzhou.<\/p>\n

On arrival police urged her to “return the illegal income” she had earned from her writing to reduce her sentence.<\/p>\n

“It’s a very dirty practice,” said the lawyer, noting the central government in Beijing has issued several directives against it.<\/p>\n

‘Social awakening’<\/strong><\/p>\n

Activists see the crackdown on alleged obscenity as part of a wider push to suppress LGBTQ expression — an effort that has expanded under President Xi Jinping.<\/p>\n

China classified homosexuality as a crime until 1997 and a mental illness until 2001.<\/p>\n

Same-sex marriage is not legal and discrimination remains widespread.<\/p>\n

The Boys’ Love genre — often lightly erotic but sometimes overtly explicit — has become increasingly censored as its popularity has boomed.<\/p>\n

Television adaptations have rewritten male lovers as friends, as same-sex relationships are banned from the screen.<\/p>\n

In 2018, a writer known by her pseudonym Tianyi was sentenced to over a decade in prison for earning US$21,000 (RM89,400) from a homoerotic novel about a teacher and his student.<\/p>\n

Last year, a court in Anhui province heard 12 cases involving spreading obscene content for profit, according to public records which do not give outcomes of the trials.<\/p>\n

Many in China “feel less and less space to express themselves freely”, said Ge, the lecturer and a longtime reader of Boys’ Love.<\/p>\n

“It’s not just about posting something on social media, it’s about reading something in their private life.”<\/p>\n

As news of the crackdown spread, Haitang users rushed to cancel their accounts.<\/p>\n

But writer Miu Miu said she has not given up hope she might be able to finish her favourite stories.<\/p>\n

“Sexual knowledge has become taboo,” she said.<\/p>\n

“This is a social awakening.” — AFP<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

China cracks down on women writing gay erotica, some face up to 10 years in jail<\/sub><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BEIJING, July 11 — Chinese women who publish homoerotica online say they are being threatened with fines and jail time, as increasing enforcement of vague obscenity charges targets a rare space for LGBTQ identity and feminism. In recent months, Chinese police have detained dozens of writers on Haitang Literature City, a Taiwan-based website known for…<\/p>\n

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