Gender Law Equality
Opening a Gender and Equality Lens for Law
“We will not see the day of gender equality in our lifetimes, and it is unlikely that our next generation will either.”
That’s the beginning of the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report 2020, released late last year, not the prognosis for the future we might have expected.
Yet, just as no prophet could have anticipated the sudden epidemic, no one could have engineered in advance the counter-trend of gender issues in 2020, where the rice rabbit is silenced and the everyday is disrupted, which has so profoundly stepped into popular discourse and so poignantly into public space that domestic violence becomes public governance, where women’s everyday situations are clearly seen, and where sisters ride the wave.
Here we comb through the rule of law events related to sexuality and gender that took place in mainland China in 2020. Some of them have topped the hotspots and become instant talk, some are quietly mediocre but should be a strong record, and some are still walking alone in the discourse zone to this day, looking forward to victory in a brand new time and space.
Unlike other annual reviews of sexuality and gender, our words here are either about cases that have gone to justice or about topics that have triggered legal change.
While the goal of rebuilding a culture of gender equality and diversity and openness may be out of reach for those of us living in the present, concrete and visible cases or regulations can have a swift and palpable impact. Although not all of these cases have reached a satisfactory conclusion, and not all of the provisions of these laws are satisfactory, they truly reflect the strong pulse of gender issues in the rolling times.
The case of a female employee who was fired for staying home with her child during an epidemic
Keywords: motherhood, family division of labor, equal employment
Cartoon by Wu Zhiru
On March 23, 2020, Li Yun (a pseudonym), who was feeding her child at home, suddenly received a pickup call from a courier who said it was a Notice of Termination of Labor Contract.
Li Yun served in a foreign enterprise in Beijing and worked for nearly 13 years since 2007. after giving birth in 2018, Li Yun has been hiring a nanny to look after her child. However, after the epidemic this year, the nanny was unable to come to Beijing, and her husband needed to be at work, so she had to take time off to look after the child at home.
The Beijing Human Resources and Social Security Bureau’s No. 13 document issued on January 31, 2020 states that “each household may have one employee at home to look after minor children, which is considered to be a situation where normal labor cannot be provided due to quarantine measures or other emergency measures implemented by the government, during which the employee’s salary will be paid according to attendance by the company to which the employee belongs”.
Li Yun thus applied to the company for paid home care but was refused, on the grounds that the child was not yet in kindergarten and was not covered by the notice. The company cited the document No. 17 issued by the Human Resources and Social Security Bureau, which states that “minor children who need to be cared for at home are those who need to be cared for at home during the epidemic prevention and control period due to the delayed opening of primary and secondary schools and kindergartens.”
After that, Li Yun’s application for paid leave, annual leave and unpaid leave was approved by the company. Until March 16, a day when Li Yun did not receive a weibo or phone call from the company, but the HR specialist rejected her fourth leave application for the 15th via email.
Li Yun did not check and reply to the email in time, and the company then signed her zero-compensation termination notice on March 20 for being absent from work for 4 consecutive days.
Short Comment]
We have no way of knowing whether she filed for labor arbitration, returned to the company or received compensation, but the issues of family division of labor, maternal work and equal employment opportunity are obvious in the case.
For a long time, most of the reproductive work of the family was done by the female members, and the father of the children was considered to be doing a good job outside of the home, and if he came home from work and entertained the children, he was seen as a model husband.
During home confinement, many men who are unable to work outside the home remain at home, and the imbalance between fatherhood and motherhood becomes more pronounced. After the closure was lifted, fathers returned to work, and mothers, even if they had jobs, were still systematically assigned to stay at home and care for children who did not attend school. Through another official statement, we may be able to see more clearly the impact of motherhood in society. “Delay the start of the school year, the woman is mainly at home to look after the children”, a proposal put forward by the Jinan Education Bureau in a press conference, which was adopted in Jinan and officially issued to companies. The sacrifice of the individual, not only is the norm of traditional concepts, surprisingly, has also become an explicit provision of the parties concerned, the work of parenting will always be attributed to the core of the motherhood concept of motherhood, Li Yun’s dismissal is just a microcosm of the many women sacrificed due to motherhood.
The tying of women to motherhood is a historical and institutional arrangement in a patriarchal society, where women are surrounded by household chores all day long, unable to have “a room of their own,” and lose their social participation and economic independence.
According to reports, 1.4 times more women than men were fired, suspended or affected by work in Japan during the epidemic. Several international surveys have also shown that the female poverty rate has increased significantly globally this year. To break the fate of women as subordinate to men, we must start by guaranteeing women’s equal employment rights, especially by showing official attitudes during the epidemic.
Civil Code
Keywords : sexual harassment liability, same-sex marriage, divorce cooling-off period
Civil Code Promotion in Shanghai Subway on December 31, 2020 ZHANGJING
On May 28, 2020, the Civil Code of the People’s Republic of China, known as the “encyclopedia of social life,” was voted by the Third Session of the 13th National People’s Congress and will take effect on New Year’s Day 2021.
Article 1010 of the law stipulates the responsibility for sexual harassment and the obligation of the organization to prevent and control it.
If sexual harassment is committed against another person against his or her will by means of words, texts, images, physical acts, etc., the victim has the right to request the perpetrator to bear civil liability in accordance with the law.
Institutions, enterprises, schools and other units shall take reasonable measures to prevent, receive complaints, investigate and dispose of sexual harassment by using their authority and subordination.
In the Marriage and Family section, the article still limits marriage to the union of a man and a woman as husband and wife.
Article 1077 creates a divorce cooling-off period for spouses who divorce by agreement, after a 30-day divorce cooling-off period after application at the Civil Affairs Bureau, after which both parties will jointly receive a divorce certificate.
Short Comment]
Article 1010 of the Civil Code is the first time that the country specifies the responsibility of sexual harassment in the basic law, breaking through the gender limit of the victim, and also highlighting the responsibility of the unit again, which can be considered as a major legal progress against gender violence, but unfortunately the legal responsibility is still not specific and operable.
In the future, in conjunction with the Labor Law, the Special Regulations on Labor Protection for Female Employees, and the Regulations on the Causes of Civil Cases, victims of sexual harassment and other gender-based violence will be provided with clear legal weapons and remedies.
However, the gender restriction on the subject of marriage in the Civil Code precludes sexual minorities from entering into spousal relationships. Although this provision is only a continuation of the old law, it remains unchanged after 10,000 civil opinions on legalizing same-sex marriage, objectively providing a discourse for anti-gay discourse. At this stage, gay couples can only rely on the intended guardianship system in the General Civil Code, with a guardianship relationship as a substitute for marriage, and cannot enjoy many of the rights of heterosexual couples.
The creation of a cooling-off period further adds a procedure for contacting the marital relationship by agreement. Although the legislative intent of this article is to reduce the number of impulsive divorces, practice will give the answer as to how the parties need to be protected from domestic violence in its implementation and whether it will affect the freedom of citizens to marry and thus lead to the spread of marriage-phobia.
Bao Mouming case
Keywords: human trafficking, sexual abuse of young girls, age of sexual consent, Criminal Law Amendment (XI)
In April 2020, Bao Mouming, vice president of Yantai Jereh Petroleum Services Group, director of ZTE, and a bilingual lawyer, was exposed for allegedly sexually abusing his adopted daughter Li Xingxing (a pseudonym) and maintaining an affair with her for years, as well as forcing her to accompany him to watch child pornography videos.
The case has sparked lively discussions about illegal adoption, human trafficking, age of sexual consent, and the ethics of news reporting.
The conclusion of the investigation issued by the joint supervisory group of the Supreme Prosecutor and the Ministry of Public Security on September 17, 2020, stated that after a thorough and in-depth investigation, the available evidence could not confirm that Bao Mouming’s behavior constituted a crime of sexual assault. The relevant authorities subsequently revoked Bao’s qualification as a lawyer and notified Bao of his U.S. citizenship and deported him.
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The official joint investigation conclusion released nearly six months later put the case of Bao Mouming to rest.
However, the discussion related to this incident is no less significant. Although some netizens have launched a siege against women’s rights accounts on the grounds of “reversal of the investigation results,” the media and social organizations have also presented and discussed issues such as underground human trafficking in the name of adoption and the age of sexual consent, etc. Beijing Qianqian Law Firm, Yuanzhong Family and Community Development Service Center and Beijing Weiping More issued a call to improve the criminal law provisions related to the crime of sexual assault. Youth volunteers collected tens of thousands of comments and suggestions to mail to the National People’s Congress, calling for additional legal provisions against power sexual intercourse.
On December 26, 2020, the Amendment to the Criminal Law (XI) was passed by the Standing Committee of the NPC, adding the crime of sexual assault by persons with special duties: “A person who has special duties such as guardianship, adoption, care, education, medical treatment, etc. for a minor female who has reached the age of fourteen or less than sixteen, and has sexual intercourse with such minor female, shall be sentenced to not more than three years fixed-term imprisonment; if the circumstances are aggravated, a fixed-term imprisonment of more than three years and less than ten years. “If a person commits an act under the preceding paragraph and at the same time constitutes a crime under Article 236 of this Law, he shall be convicted and punished in accordance with the provisions of the heavier penalty.”
To a certain extent, the Bao Mouming case and the ensuing social mobilization to discuss and improve the legislation reflect the role of public participation that cannot be ignored.
Sexual harassment case of female sanitation workers in Guangzhou
Keywords: female worker, sexual harassment
Ms. Huang’s back Surfing News reporter Chen Xuhou
On June 15, 2020, Guangzhou Yuexiu District People’s Court accepted Ms. Huang’s case against her supervisor for sexual harassment. Ms. Huang, a sanitation worker in Yuexiu District, went to work in Guangzhou with her husband in 2016, and she sued her sanitation station and station manager Zhou Moumou.
According to media reports, Zhou began sending some sexually suggestive pictures and small videos to Ms. Huang soon after she joined the company, and later often used working hours to pester her at her post, for work and family Ms. Huang has chosen to hold back for four years.
But once Zhou to the leader drunk as a reason, told Ms. Huang’s husband to drive the leader home, and then called her and said, “is deliberately your husband off, you come down to the office, I would love to and you x x”, finally let Ms. Huang unbearable. She was determined to save the evidence and use legal weapons to protect herself.
The company’s main business is to provide a wide range of products and services to the public. The company also announced the temporary suspension of the sanitation station chief Zhou Moumou.
So far, the case has become the first “sexual harassment case” in which the plaintiff’s claims have been fully realized since sexual harassment became a new cause of civil disputes at the end of 2018.
Short comment]
Sexual harassment is no longer the narcissistic delusion of a few women, but is indeed a real threat to women of all classes and ages. It is possible for harassment to occur in the most inconspicuous corners, and the smallest power relations are enough to silence the harassed.
Sexual harassment in the workplace not only undermines a woman’s sense of personal security, it can also lead to the departure of the harassed person from her job, further exacerbating the gender gap in the workplace.
The Civil Code will come into effect in 2021, and this case has contributed to the deepening of the Code’s provisions, and has had an encouraging effect on the prevalence of sexual harassment in the workplace, which is difficult to cure, and the assumption of responsibility by the employer has prepared a positive condition for workers to defend their rights.
The incident of Lei Chong’s internship lawyer
Key words: public interest, community power, industry response
A letter sent by the community @LeiChang turned himself in?
In June 2020, it was revealed that Lei Breaking, a former famous public defender who had been accused of sexual assault, was interning at Guangdong Jinqiao Baxin Law Firm, and would become a practicing lawyer when the date was up.
On June 24, Hua Hua (a pseudonym), a client who was sexually assaulted back then, sent a complaint letter to the Guangzhou Law Society, requesting the Law Society to reconsider Lei intrusion’s qualification as an intern lawyer.
On June 26, the famous feminist account “Nitro Beauty” published “Joint Signing|Boycott Sexual Assailant Lei Chong as a Lawyer”, which quickly received a wide response, with more than 700 netizens participating in the joint signing.
On August 24, the Guangzhou Bar Association issued a formal response, saying that Lei’s internship papers had been cancelled.
On July 23, 2018, Hua Hua posted on the Internet that she was sexually assaulted by Lei Chuan, the organizer of a hiking activity of Yiyou Public Welfare three years ago.
On the same day, Lei broke into his circle of friends to “acknowledge the facts in the article, willing to assume criminal responsibility, and is considering turning himself in to the police”, and then issued a note to cover up his actions, saying that he was in a relationship with the informant at the time, “which was mixed with public welfare and love”.
On July 24, Hua Hua denied the “lovers” claim in several media interviews, and revealed that she “knew there were other victims”. Since then, Yiyou Public Welfare issued an announcement to remove Lei’s position as the head of the charity, and Beijing police also announced their involvement in the investigation.
Short Comment]
As an anti-discrimination fighter, Lei has been remembered by history for his efforts and contributions to public welfare for many hepatitis B virus carriers, but the fighter’s words and actions on gender issues are indeed the opposite case of gender discrimination and infringement.
Anti-discrimination advocates and infringers against women, who should be incompatible with each other, have become two sides of the same person.
In fact, Lei is not alone, Deng Fei, Zhou Fei, Liu Mang, Liu Tao, a series of public welfare circle of rice rabbits expose some originally wearing a halo of people overshadowed by a layer of sexual harassment. This also reminds us more and more, how widespread the existence of sexual harassment, its foci parasitic in every capillary of society.
Because sex/gender, as a form of discrimination, as a form of violence, is so much more insidious than race, disease, or anything else, and is taken for granted.
Lei’s disqualification as a trainee lawyer is one of the few victorious battles against gender violence.
From speaking out to standing up, and from standing up to reaching out, the visibility of gender issues has increased, and the community that has gradually taken shape has begun to show the power of solidarity and action.
To specifically address sexual harassment in the workplace in different industries, Fountain Law and other co-creators have jointly produced the first open source toolkit against sexual harassment in the workplace in China, and gender-friendly lawmakers and a self-sponsored team of journalists have conducted industry-specific occupational safety surveys for the legal services industry and female journalists, respectively, moving the prevention and management of gender violence into a new chapter of refinement and industrialization.
Ram’s case
Keywords: perfect victim, Law Against Domestic Violence, breakup violence
Rahm live singing before life Netflix
At about 20:50 on September 14, Ram, a net red Tibetan girl from Guan Yin Qiao Town, Maesca Village, Jinchuan County, Aba Prefecture, Sichuan Province, was live-streaming on the ShakeYin platform when she was set on fire by her ex-husband Tang who broke into her home after splashing gasoline all over her body. 16 days later, Ram, who was only 30 years old, died after treatment failed, leaving behind two sons who were not yet adults and a frail and sickly father.
Ram’s family said that Ram and Tang had been married for 12 years and had suffered repeated domestic violence, which Ram had always endured for the sake of the children. After Ram divorced Tang for the first time in March this year, Tang immediately threatened to kill the children to “get back together”, and after two failed attempts to call the police, Ram agreed to remarry.
Two weeks later, Tang threatened to harm Ram and her sister again, and Ram called the police and received a response that since she had chosen to remarry, “this is your own family matter.
When Ram turned to the local women’s union to file a complaint, she was denied help because “other women were worse off”.
Not giving up on her divorce claim, Ram was finally granted court support in June, but the court also awarded custody of the two children to Tang. During the lawsuit and after the verdict, Tang never gave up looking for Ram who was in hiding, harassing and beating up relatives who helped Ram until the day of the arson.
[Short Comment
The third edition of the National Bureau of Statistics and the All-China Women’s Federation Survey on the Status of Women in China showed that 24.7 percent of married women have suffered from different forms of domestic violence by their spouses. The Supreme People’s Court disclosed in 2015 that intentional homicide cases involving domestic violence accounted for nearly 10% of all intentional homicide cases. Domestic violence is the sword of Damocles hanging over the heads of many married women at all times. Although the consequences are serious, it is hidden and hard to see. During the epidemic, the use of special measures such as confinement and isolation has increased domestic violence geometrically.
Ram was a typical perfect victim, beautiful, kind, cheerful and self-empowered, seeking out the police and the Women’s Union in case of trouble. Even so, time and time again, Ram was rejected, and violence, dressed in the legal fancy dress of family affection, entered like nobody’s business. It was the violent and cruel Tang who took Ram’s life, the backward and intransigent thinking, and the negligence of the responsible institutions and staff. The absurdity of the public sector’s understanding of domestic affairs needs to be changed immediately, as it is obsessed with “family harmony” and treats the victim’s report as a trivial matter of the couple’s daily life without intervention.
It has been more than four years since the enactment of the Law Against Domestic Violence, but cautions and protection orders are still difficult to apply for. Without training on the anti-domestic violence law for responsible departments and strong accountability for malfeasance, Ram will not be the last name to suffer from domestic violence.
Same-Sex Partner Custody Cases
Keywords: same-sex couples, parental rights
Xiaoti (a pseudonym) and Ami (a pseudonym) are same-sex couples who decided during their relationship, after consultation and agreement, that Xiaoti would provide the eggs and Ami would produce the child by way of pregnancy.
In March 2019 Xiaoti offered to pay for sperm to grow an embryo with her own eggs, and in December 2019 Ami gave birth to a baby girl, Yaya, in a hospital in Xiamen, with the mother recorded on the birth medical certificate as Ami and no father information recorded.
On February 26, 2020, due to a conflict between the two parties, Ami took Yaya away and did not allow Xiaotie to see the child.
On May 9, 2020, Xiaoti applied to the Xiamen Huli District Court for a paternity test with Yaya, but was refused by Ami.
After that, Xiaotie took Ami to court on the grounds that Ami was the surrogate mother of Yaya, and demanded a judgment that Yaya be raised by herself.
In September, the Huli Court of First Instance rejected Xiaoti’s request, after Xiaoti appealed, the case is currently in the second trial.
Short comment]
The case is a good example of how to make the most of the situation. They are the real individuals in the world after the unrealistic romantic fantasies about sexual minorities are removed. Gay people are also mortal.
China’s current law does not recognize same-sex marriage, does not allow surrogate reproduction, and the practice of A egg B pregnancy does not guarantee that both partners have equal parental rights to their infants. The first case of dispute over the custody of same-sex couples was pronounced in Xiamen, but the related legal issues have not been fully clarified, and the gay community’s thirst for happiness is still drifting in the torn and sandwiched between reality and legal rules.
Clear standards are needed on how to deal with the objective biological blood relationship and how to share the custody visitation rights of the pregnant mother of the egg mother. In another dispute over the custody of same-sex couples heard by the Zhoushan court in Zhejiang Province, the issue of the validity of same-sex marriages contracted by nationals outside of China has also arisen, and these difficult issues have been urgently thrown to the legislature and the judiciary to make decisions and give appropriate answers.
Fang Yangyang Case
Keywords: rural women, domestic violence, childbirth, rights of the disabled
Screenshot of the video of Fang Yangyang’s wedding day.
Fang Yangyang, from Fangzhuang Village in Qiancao Town, Plain County, Dezhou City, Shandong Province, was introduced by a matchmaker in 2016 and married into the family of Zhang B., from Zhangzhuang Village, Zhangzhuang Town, Yucheng City, a few kilometers away from her mother’s home.
Fang Yangyang was born in 1997 and is the only daughter in her family. Her mother had a certain degree of mental impairment, and when she grew up, Fang Yangyang also showed mild mental retardation. After her marriage, Fang Yang Yang never became pregnant and gradually became displeased with her husband Zhang C and her in-laws, who began to abuse and beat her.
Zhang C’s mother later recalled that the family exhausted their assets in order to marry Fang Yangyang, and that “the whole family was very angry about not being able to get pregnant.
At the end of 2017, Zhang C made a request to Fang Yangyang’s father to return the $130,000 bride price. After being rejected by Fang’s father, the abuse became more severe, starving, confinement, beating the body with wooden sticks, punishing standing outside the house in winter, not allowing access to relatives, all kinds of torture dying Fang Yang Yang finally lost her life on January 31, 2019, after a blunt force trauma, at the age of 22. Due to extreme malnutrition, at the time of her death, Fang Yangyang was left with just over 60 pounds of her 160-pound weight at the time of her marriage.
On January 22, 2020, the Yucheng People’s Court sentenced Fang Yangyang’s husband and in-laws in the first instance to prison terms ranging from two to three years for the crime of abuse, with the husband, Zhang C, applying a suspended sentence. The verdict quickly sparked controversy over the lenient sentences, and the Dezhou Intermediate People’s Court later reversed the original verdict on Feb. 19 and sent the case back for a retrial.
The case was sent to the Yucheng City People’s Court on Nov. 27 before the case was reopened, but the case has not yet been reported or sentenced.
Short Commentary
Among the many comments on Fang Yangyang’s case, the article “The Life of the Discarded Fang Yangyang” is as light as a feather but relevant and true amidst the many sorrowful mourning. Fang Yangyang’s body carries too much of the “unbearable weight” of the current society, rural, poor, infertile, disabled. In order to continue the legacy of the “old bachelor” who married his mentally challenged “wife”, he finally failed to get a son, so selling his daughter and asking for the bride price became the natural choice of Fang’s father to make up for this “lost money deal”. The natural choice.
I wonder if Fang Yang Yang, who was smiling brightly at the wedding, ever thought that the 130,000 bride price her father received was her “value” as a human being? But what she certainly did not expect was that she would face the prospect of becoming a waste of food in the eyes of the Zhang family because of her inability to bear children, and eventually being tortured to death.
The question we need to ask in the Fang Yang Yang case is, on what grounds did the local court indulge the three perpetrators of the violence that led to the death of the young and fit Fang Yang Yang? Does the judiciary also accept the cannibalism of treating daughters-in-law as the private property of their in-laws, and ignore the value of the lives of the mentally challenged and treat them as the family’s “reproductive machines”?
The question that needs to be asked is whether, today, a poor and disabled rural woman can still only use her fertility as a quid pro quo for the bun of life?
Behind one Fang Yang Yang, how many other Fang Yang Yang’s rights to health and even life are being trampled on because of the extreme lack of social resources for people with disabilities?
Trans child reversal treatment incident
Keywords: transgender, domestic violence
A message for help sent by Ke Orange in a qq group.
“I was taken away by three people who claimed to be police officers!” On November 29, 2020, after leaving a message for help in a QQ group, Ke Orange disappeared.
Born in Weifang, Shandong Province, Ke Orange, who had won the Asian Robotics Championship All-Around Challenge event and also won the first prize in the National Youth Informatics League, decided in the summer of 2020 that she wanted to be a girl after 18 years of being a boy.
Ta began taking estrogen-based drugs, and soon afterwards a violent family conflict erupted when her parents found out. After running away from home, Kagome wrote a “police power of attorney” and gave it to her friends in hopes that they would report her when she had “no contact with the outside world for 24 hours”.
Then, news of a possible mandatory “reversal of treatment” popped up, and Ke Orange had her cell phone confiscated and was sent to the infamous Jinan Hongkai School for Internet Addiction by her parents.
Volunteers formed the “Ke Orange Rescue Group” to go around and rescue her, but to no avail. The Hongkai school told the volunteers that Ke Orange was indeed sent here by her parents, but was also picked up by them.
Pictures from Ke Orange’s mother show that Ke Orange is eating in a room equipped with cameras, with students in school uniforms behind him and a man in camouflage beside him.
Volunteers have contacted the police in Jinan and Weifang to reflect the situation of Ke Orange’s restricted personal freedom, but have been denied requests for further treatment by the police on the grounds of family matters. So far, Ke Orange is still out of contact.
Short Comment]
This is a very clear case, Ke Orange is a citizen over 18 years old, with clear consciousness and intention to act freely, and her personal freedom should not be restricted in any illegal way, but it is also an extremely complicated case, because it is “natural” to educate a “rebellious” and “perverted” child, and outsiders have no right to comment.
The volunteers of the Orange Rescue Group have also tried to downplay the role of transgender in the Orange case, asking only for the restriction of movement of adults, but the authorities have not yet done what they should have done. Misconceptions about transgenderism and myths about domesticity have completely overshadowed law enforcement’s understanding and fulfillment of personal freedom and legal duties.
Not coincidentally, in early December, an adult transgender girl, also from Shandong, was taken out of her boarding school in Shanghai by her parents and asked to undergo psychiatric treatment. During the volunteers’ rescue, police officers at the police station also gave the response that the family matter would not be handled.
Today, the transgender community still faces discrimination from society at large, and even some sexual minorities have a lot to say about trans children, leaving them in a cramped existence. When they are harmed, the public sector cannot use the excuse that they are not yet authorized by law to take special care of them, because even under the existing regulations, law enforcement has enough space and authority to do the minimum protection for citizens.
String v. Zhu Jun Sexual Harassment Case
Keywords: rice rabbit, workplace sexual harassment, gender shaming, female solidarity
Strings walking out of the courtroom after the trial Netflix
On July 26, 2018, Strings, through @MaiBurntStudent, posted on Weibo, alleging that Zhu Jun had committed lewd acts against her in a dressing room four years ago. In a later media interview, Strings said she was told by Zhu Jun that she looked like his wife and was molested by him through her clothes when she interviewed Zhu Jun alone in the dressing room during her internship in the Art of Life column in 2014. The police did not file a case, and asked him to consider Zhu Jun’s “positive influence,” and sent officers to Wuhan to notify his family.
After being warned and advised by the police station, the case was closed, but since then String and her friend Mai have been repeatedly pressured by different parties and even threatened by strange phone calls.
In August 2018, Zhu Jun issued a statement calling the information a rumor and filed a lawsuit with the Beijing Haidian Court, demanding that String and McBurn bear “reputation infringement liability” and pay 655,000 yuan in damages.
In October 2018, String was accepted to sue Zhu Jun for personality infringement in the Beijing Haidian Court. In 2019, after the introduction of the new “Rules on the Causes of Civil Cases”, String submitted an application to the court to amend the cause of action to “dispute over liability for sexual harassment damages”.
On December 2, 2020, the case of String v. Zhu Jun was heard at the Haidian Court, and the trial lasted from late afternoon until late at night. The trial process was not yet complete, and in order to have another chance to sit in court, String applied for the recusal of three judges at the end and asked for another juror to form a panel.
There is still no result of the case.
[Short Comment
The company’s reputation as a “virtuous” artist continues to crumble with the release of a series of videos of Zhu Jun harassing different women on public occasions.
The internet has been full of noise, with private letters, comments and public rumors, shaming the artist’s appearance, slut-shaming and the most direct and vicious curses.
Some have even linked the topic of sexual harassment and the legitimate struggle of String and her friends to foreign forces and color revolutions, as if by solving the problem of String, the good situation of stability and unity would be guaranteed and the core values of equality, justice and rule of law would be immediately realized.
In contrast to the attempts to silence women, there was a vigil outside Danling Street that lasted until midnight, with supporters coming from all directions and even the fathers of sexual assault victims who had traveled to Beijing from the south.
“Who are String’s friends?”
“We’re all friends of Strings!”
The women who woke up that night on December 2 had this common name. They saw each other and gathered into the warmest image of the cold winter.
For a year in which the gender issue of 2020 has had its ups and downs, ten events alone cannot summarize the twists and turns and efforts made in the cause of gender affirmation.
The issue of non-marital reproductive rights is highlighted in the maternity insurance case of a single mother in Shanghai, the issue of dating violence in the murder case of a female college student in Nanjing, the issue of slut shaming reflected in the incident of a woman being rumored to cheat in Hangzhou, the issue of sex education reflected in the case of homophobic textbooks sold in Jingdong, the issue of homosexuality being stigmatized implied in the case of sexual assault in Shenzhen, and the issue of gender violence being dissipated by entertainment as reminded by the “septic tank warning” in the case of the murdered wife and mutilated body in Hangzhou, there is still a long road ahead to achieve the ideal of sex-friendliness and zero discrimination.
What is encouraging is that more and more survivors of gender-based violence are speaking out about their pain, and more and more people are beginning to engage with and understand gender issues.
With He Qian’s “Know My Name” and String’s “Ask History for Answers,” sexual shame is no longer an obstacle for victims to seek justice; women’s issues are no longer synonymous with “mother-in-law”; women, LGBTQ, and all gender-diverse identities are taking back their own rights of speech, interpretation, body, and even development, and using their subjectivity to become a brilliant light to tear open the dark night of male hegemony.
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