LGBT Rights in China (and elsewhere), to 2010
Homosexuality in China has been documented going back millennia. Historically, the situation was complicated, with a degree of acceptance for certain classes and at certain points of time, and less acceptance at others. During the Qing era, the government enacted the first official ban on consensual homosexual relations, and during the "Self Strengthening Movement" after the Opium Wars, historical instances of homosexuality in China were increasingly ignored or censored. After the "Xinhai Revolution" establishing the Republic of China, explicit legal bans on homosexual relations were abolished, though at the same time the Republic period saw a degree of intensification of homophobia in society
With the establishment of the Socialist Republic of China in 1934, homosexuality remained legal. The ruling Communist Party itself had mixed opinions on the matter but generally leaned in favor of gay rights in theory. Some of the largest cities saw a degree of open advocacy for gay rights, with informal Party protection in those areas. Through much of China and among the masses, however, homosexuality was seen in a rather negative light. In order to pander to the masses, lessen dissent, and aid in the strengthening of party control, the Party took what was (then) moderate stance of refusing to outright ban it, but considering it to be an "abnormality" and "mental illness" (though not necessarily an urgent public health crisis), and refusing to make any public support for gay rights (though local party branches in some particularly progressive areas were informally allowed to take a different stance)
Socialist China in the 30s was far from a perfect place for LGBT people, but was nonetheless a place some ended up seeking refuge in. Georgy Chicherin was one such example. A Bolshevik and former Menshevik, and a gay man, he had for a time been the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs in the USSR, and had been trusted by Stalin. But things would take a turn for the worse, with his criticism of certain politicians contributing in part to him losing favor among Soviet leadership, and with the recriminalization of homosexuality in the USSR in 1933, he found himself largely sidelined. After being accused of Trotskyism and with an impending trial for that and homosexuality, he fled from the USSR (with a group of Trotskyites, though he himself was not one at that time) and was quietly granted refuge within China. At around the same time, the Nazis were rising to power in Germany and had (among many other things) suppressed the "Scientific-Humanitarian Committee" and the "Institute for Sexual Science", organizations that studied sexuality and advocated for LGBT rights. A number of figures associated with the organizations fled to China, and while Magnus Hirschfeld himself (the founder of those organizations) went into exile first in France, he visited China and later took up residence there, with the Chinese government being interested in funding sexual research of their own. As the 30s progressed and Nazi repression increased, the Chinese government was one of the most open countries when it came to accepting refugees, regarding this issue and more broadly as well
Government-funded research ended up showing that homosexuality was apparently natural and unharmful, which helped contribute to a solidifying of (at least theoretical) support for gay rights among the Communist Party leadership. But the Party in the 30s, 40s, and 50s was in no mood to push major change on that front - it was enough to balance other matters like industrialization, expansion of education and infrastructure, and more prioritized social reforms like women's liberation (given higher prioritization due to the potential to significantly boost production with women increasingly entering the workforce - a sort of "two birds, one stone" situation). Those decades saw a slow shift in opinions among the cities, but continued conservative stances in the countryside, with conservative sentiment periodically bubbling over into incidents of mass homophobic hysteria and mob violence. In an attempt to appease the rural conservatives and also minimize harm done, the Party enacted a "public health campaign" in areas with such conservative sentiment, snatching up those accused of homosexuality, and placing them in "curative mental sanitoriums". Though marketed to the public as places that would use science to turn people heterosexual, the sanitoriums were run by the Ministry of Health and Mental Hygiene (which had accepted the science backing the pro-homosexual rights arguments), and in actuality largely acted as secluded gay communities where those who were well and truly rejected by their communities could find some covert refuge. With the end of these "public health campaigns" and the shifting social and legal winds, most of the sanitoriums would be closed down, but some such areas had grown so large that the opening-up would see significant LGBT communities remaining in the area
The 60s saw an acceleration of social change in China. Access to, quality of, and level of education had grown significantly since the conditions immediately after the Second Sino-Japanese War and the declaration of the Socialist Republic. The economy had significantly expanded, with the increasingly educated and literate population having more access to information (including social science/psychology publications, such as those increasingly being published suggesting that the "homosexuality as mental illness" approach was not appropriate). And the "down from the mountains and up from the countryside" phenomenon was in full swing - a combination of workers seeking industrial work (with mechanization and improved farming techniques leading to greater agricultural output from fewer workers) and youth seeking education in the higher-quality urban schools had led to a sharp uptick in urbanization. Among other things, research showed that simply being in the cities, for a number of reasons including greater exposure to a diversity of people and ideas, led to both a base shift in favor of more progressive stances and increased openness to attempts by the Party to further push social progress. For these reasons and others, the 60s saw a rise in social activism, particularly among youth and students but also among urban areas in general, for further social progress, including on LGBT rights. By 1969, the Party felt secure enough to officially declassify homosexuality as a mental illness, and to shift from appeasement of rural conservatives to a more robust protection of the right of homosexuals to openly exist across the country without fear of retribution or need to be relocated
The Party was cautious in advocating for further rights. But with an increased ability for pro-gay public advocacy at the grassroots, and with the party quietly supporting the movement through side-channels even as it publicly still tended to avoid talking about the issue, public opinion would continue to shift in the 70s. By 1972, military regulations were changed to explicitly allow for openly gay persons to serve (with instances of service in the Chinese intervention in the Second Indochina War getting some attention and use by the movement to shift hearts and minds), and in 1974, reforms were passed broadly banning discrimination regarding sexual orientation. In 1979, civil unions were established to give gay partnership rights, and in 1984, the Party made the national marriage code gender-neutral, while also legalizing adoption to non-straight couples. China thus became the first country to legalize gay marriage (with Korea soon-after becoming the second). Further developments in the expansion of LGBT rights would occur, with the 90s seeing transgender protection and identity laws, non-discrimination legislation for gender identity and expression, and transitioning surgery being added to the national universal healthcare system
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Party leadership desired to encourage LGBT rights abroad as well, but in the 70s and 80s, this just was not a practical possibility. By the 90s, however, public opinion in other countries had begun to shift, to the point where there could be room for China to have an impact. It became a matter of some debate within the Party and country - China entered the 90s strong and on a good trajectory, but the fall of the USSR and its bloc left China feeling rather isolated and afraid of rocking the boat. Plus the 90s also saw a strong shift in China in favor of promoting green policy at home and abroad. Some in the party suggested leveraging the use of foreign aid in order to promote LGBT rights abroad, but this was seen as potentially further isolating the country and threatening the global green development solidarity aid efforts. So the Party in the 90s went with a "soft touch" approach, with limited attempts to somewhat influence things abroad here and there, but generally trying to avoid taking risks
The 2000s saw a further shift abroad, however, with opinion in various areas shifting even more towards acceptance of LGBT rights. The Party began to do more, with the creation of a "two tier" economic aid system - giving some development aid to various poorer countries regardless of their civil rights stances, but giving more aid to those countries that were willing to enact legislation to protect human rights (not just LGBT rights, though the political shift in the Party coincided with a global shift in attitudes on that issue as well as domestic discourse over desires to do more to promote LGBT rights in particular), or remove/reduce restrictions if in place. The Party also took other measures, such as the creation of the "Chicherin Brigades" (named after the Soviet refugee, who became a notable advocate for gay rights after immigrating to China), all-LGBT subdivisions of the Solidarity Corps, with the intent to expand representation in areas assisted overseas. LGBT people could of course also serve in the regular Solidarity Corps groups, and plenty did, with less risk of danger by being able to blend in with the crowd, but the Chicherin Brigades (as well as all-woman units, for a similar purpose regarding promotion of feminist ideas abroad) nonetheless had some success in somewhat shifting opinion in some areas. And the Party was able to exert a fair amount of soft power for influence via the Chinese media empire, as well
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By the end of the 2000s, the LGBT rights movement had seen a fair amount of success around the globe, Various parts of the Americas, Oceania, and Europe had also seen expansions of rights. Even areas like Africa and Asia, which saw substantial opposition overall, saw some successes. In Africa, Mozambique, Namibia, and particularly communist Angola followed South Africa in the direction of substantial LGBT rights legislation and initiatives (in some part, but not only, due to Chinese involvement in the region), and other areas saw at least some limited reforms. In Asia, communist Indonesia stood out as a major success for the movement, and under the Faheem government, Pakistan had reduced penalties and showed potential for further reductions. The LGBT movement entered the new decade with the potential for even more success
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As for within China itself, by the end of the 2000s, legal rights and protections had been in place for LGBT people for years and in many cases decades. By this time, the laws were strongly enforced. And the general public was generally supportive of LGBT issues - some opposition remained, particularly in the rural areas, but that opposition had been rendered irrelevant as a social force of any strength, and individual incidents were steadily on the decline even in those areas
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(and a larger version of the map in the thing)
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(note that it uses a midyear 2010 map as a base, there's some cases where the base had colorings that don't necessarily make sense according to what I can see, like Pakistan having "life in prison" when the law doesn't actually appear to have been as such, so the coloring of Pakistan here represents lessened penalties vs what the base map had, despite the current version of the map showing even lesser penalties than this one despite no apparent actual legal change since when the base map was made. I considered just changing it to be more accurate, but since that would have meant having to double check every country in order to satisfy a half-assed sense of perfectionism, I opted to instead go for a half-assed attempt at "authenticity")
(which kinda flies out the window with the whole "foreign marriages recognized" color, since that wasn't a thing until 2012, and has ceased to exist... I actually made a version of this map for the present day back in like 2019 or something, before they changed it to purple, and what can I say, I just like the older color more so I stuck with it)