Many campus LGBTQ clubs have never been officially recognized or condoned, but have been able to operate unofficially for years under the radar, posting content online and carrying out certain activities when possible amidst periodic crackdowns.
Those now deleted include: Tsinghua University’s unofficial LGBTQ club Purple, Peking University’s unofficial LGBTQ club Colorsworld; Fudan University’s Zhiheshe; Wuhan University’s Gender Equality Research Association; Nanjing University’s Same Sky Association for Gender Equality; Xi’An Academy of Fine Art’s Olive Tree Group; Renmin University of China’s Sex and Gender Research Society, and similar research-oriented groups at Huazhong University of Science and Technology and East China Normal...
In 2015, Fan sued China’s top censorship body after “Mama Rainbow,” his documentary about mothers coming to terms with the sexual identity of their gay and lesbian children, also mysteriously, simultaneously disappeared overnight from major video streamers that had previously hosted the content without issue. The court verdict declared that the censorship authorities had not itself released a specific directive calling for the film to be removed.
“I can’t accept these accounts being disappeared like this – they helped so many people like me,” one WeChat commenter blogging about the incident wrote. “This clean-up action is tantamount to outright discrimination and persecution of China’s sexual minorities.”Companies can face financial and other consequences for failing to comply with China’s strict censorship standards. Authorities require that they carry out and foot the bill for censorship on their platforms themselves.
Foreign films featuring gay content have been censored in China, with the Beijing Intl. Film Festival abruptly cancelling a screening of “Call Me By Your Name,” and all references to Queen singer Freddie Mercury’s sexual identity and AIDS cut from “Bohemian Rhapsody.”
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