Cross posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/30697680

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Feminism is still a dirty word in China: Organised feminist activism is nearly impossible in the country in 2025, but Chinese women are still talking

https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/feminism-still-dirty-word-china

In March 2015, Beijing police arrested and detained a group of young women planning to hand out stickers on the subway on International Women’s Day opposing sexual harassment. They were jailed for more than a month, received “criminal suspect” status, and remain under surveillance today. These women became known as the Feminist Five.

Ten years later, and people are still talking about what happened.

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China has dropped 37 ranks in the Global Gender Gap Index – run by the World Economic Forum of which China is an advocate – since Xi Jinping became Communist Party General Secretary in 2012. The Communist Party diminishes the role of women in public office. For the first time in decades, there is not one woman among the 24 Politburo members, China’s executive policymaking body. Party spokespeople often encourage more traditional roles for women – as caretakers and mothers – to address an ageing population. And the Party has made it harder for women to organise or advocate for themselves in China, using online censorship and the 2017 Overseas NGO Law to stifle dissent among civil society.

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