I'm guessing this is true, which is disappointing. However, it doesn't mention any scope of these accounts though, so it's hard to say whether these were targeted for being LGBT accounts or if it's something else that got them banned.

EDIT: We'll see what the gov't does in response to this. Just read FidelCastro's comment, and remember the definition of critical support .

  • GVAGUY3 [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Remember, critical support means you don't want them to get wiped out by the US. You can absolutely call out AES for their terrible LGBT records.

    • HarryLime [any]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Honestly, China was doing fairly well on LGBT and was moving in the right direction before this. This is a disappointing step backwards. I hope the LGBT groups fight back on this and win.

      • Awoo [she/her]
        ·
        3 years ago

        It still is moving in the right direction. One company doing something shit doesn't change the trajectory of the change in social attitudes or acceptance among the people.

        There's no reason to assign everything any single company does to the entirety of China, just as you wouldn't say the entirety of America is shit and not improving on the lgbt front because of one company doing something shitty to lgbt people.

        • HarryLime [any]
          ·
          3 years ago

          There’s no reason to assign everything any single company does to the entirety of China, just as you wouldn’t say the entirety of America is shit and not improving on the lgbt front because of one company doing something shitty to lgbt people.

          I'm absolutely not doing that. This article, and other things that have happened, made it sound like there might be a locus in the Party that wants to push back against the growing acceptance of LGBT in China, and that's the thing that I hoped the Chinese LGBT movement was going to push against and defeat.

          However, since I made the comment you're responding to, I learned that this whole article might be total bullshit, so disregard what I said before.

        • Ithorian [comrade/them, he/him]
          ·
          3 years ago

          Eh this is a little different because of the strict government control of corporations in china. Its extremely unlikely that the party wasn't involved in this decision.

          • Awoo [she/her]
            ·
            3 years ago

            I think it'd be played out across all companies if it were. This is like when Hololive did some shit and everyone claimed that it was the Chinese government forcing them to when it was entirely Hololive's decision to be ridiculously over-aggressive on an issue.

            Even if it has come from government they literally promote LGBT inclusion on state media, if it did come from them it hasn't hasn't come through with the purpose being prejudice but other reasons.

      • SiskoDid2ThingsWrong [none/use name]
        ·
        3 years ago

        American queer on the internet saying “homophobia bad” is not going to give the USA Casus Belli

        I think you may have underestimated how hawkish and online Libs have become

          • SiskoDid2ThingsWrong [none/use name]
            ·
            edit-2
            3 years ago

            Seriously, this implies the USA govt is doing things because their citizens want them to,

            I mean if they genuinely didn’t give a fuck at all they wouldn’t bother with all the consent manufacturing now would they?

            Also I think a lot of the US does want war with China, mainly upper middle class people, lib and fash alike, cuz they don’t like brown people having international economic power.

              • SiskoDid2ThingsWrong [none/use name]
                ·
                3 years ago

                but they dont earnestly care if the war has board base support, and that’s been demonstrated time and time again

                Every US invasion ever was popular at the get go. Some fell out of popularity as they dragged on but the initial deployment was almost always done when there was greater than 50% support.

                Consent would actually need to be manufactured for that to work. None of us “consent” to China being invaded (not that that really matters our consent was always irrelevant.)

                I mostly agree and do think we should ignore it or down play it. It’s bad. But it can totally still feed into the consent manufacturing machine. Most Libs I know don’t want an invasion either, but still spread anti-China shot far and wide, their logic being that there’s zero chance america will actually invade and/or they have zero influence on that decision anyway. Thing is the propaganda is getting spread, doesn’t matter if the person spreading it yells till they’re blue in the face “I don’t support and invasion tho”, people just mentally edit out that part.

            • theunapologetictrans [she/her]
              ·
              3 years ago

              I wouldn't call chinese brown. Like they would be white if that term wasn't exclusive to europeans. If anything Americans hate when yellow people have economic power.

  • FidelCastro [he/him]M
    ·
    edit-2
    3 years ago

    Reminder that WeChat != The Chinese Government. Unsurprisingly, the AP article is written in a way that insinuates they’re the same.

    Hopefully the Chinese government takes action against this company. They previously forced Weibo to unban LGBTQ+ accounts, so the chances are good.

    • ssjmarx [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Is there a source that talks about exactly what action the Chinese Government took against Tencent for the Weibo ban? All of the articles I can find about it say that they retracted it themselves.

  • blobjim [he/him]
    ·
    edit-2
    3 years ago

    I'm going to assume it isn't true until I hear about it from something that isn't the AP. All they have to do is leave out something like "LGBT NGOs associated with the US" to make it seem more sinister than it might be. The VOA already reposted the AP article on their website lol. The article doesn't even give a reason for the shutdown or what accounts they shut down. It also says "It wasn’t clear whether the step was ordered by Chinese authorities". This seems more like part of a western campaign to turn "progressive" people in the west against China. Same sort of tactics as the "Chinese people are racist against blacks" stuff we keep seeing.

    Hexbear don't trust the Associated Press or western media challenge 2021. Nobody on this website should be falling for such an evidence-free article.

    • questionasker [any]
      ·
      3 years ago

      In addition to this they didn't cite any sources or give screenshots of any sort, which makes me even more skeptical

    • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]
      ·
      edit-2
      3 years ago

      I mean it definitely happened, you can check on WeChat yourself if you really want to

      But your edits are straight up denying reality at this point. WeChat confirmed the removal of the accounts themselves. No western media required for that. Also China does have a problem with racism, this year's new year's celebration featured blackface. They're not perfect

        • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]
          ·
          3 years ago

          Yeah the media definitely plays it up, and it's no where near as bad as it seems. The response by the Chinese government to the situation in Guangzhou with the eviction of African immigrants was very good, much better than I've seen in any western countries, though such a situation should never have happened.

          Though on blackface, I think it's pretty much seen as bad in most parts of the world by now. I don't live in the west and most people here think it's unacceptable. I do live in a country that has a majority black population though, with lots of experience with colonialism and racism unfortunately. Maybe it's different in places like China, where there is less exposure to these issues?

          • comi [he/him]
            ·
            edit-2
            3 years ago

            It’s not seen as racist in russia for example, it’s main association is with domovoi and cartoons though, at least it was until recently (until we imported wholesale american racism against black people, instead of our own one). I mean circa 2008 (guess what happened lol) it started getting used in malicious and very racist ways, before that it was what I mentioned (chimney sweepers/domovoi or miners association)

            • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]
              ·
              3 years ago

              Yeah where I'm from its always been a racist thing associated with the past. No American context needed. But obviously every country has their own history and it will definitely mean different things there.

        • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]
          ·
          edit-2
          3 years ago

          Check Tsinghua University, apparently their accounts to do with LGBT stuff was removed. Also apparently Peking Universities LGBT student group accounts as well

            • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]
              ·
              3 years ago

              Ok well that sucks. I haven't used WeChat in years (back when it launched in South Africa, Tencent is actually owned by a South African company) so yeah, I don't know how it works now really.

      • blobjim [he/him]
        ·
        edit-2
        3 years ago

        Why were they removed though? People's accounts get removed on social media sites all the time, sometimes flagged by spammers, sometimes from misunderstandings, or other reasons. What were the actual reasons given? What's important to see is why it was done. Which this article and probably every article about it conveniently can't answer.

    • My_Army [any]
      ·
      edit-2
      3 years ago

      If this turns out to be untrue/exaggerated it just proves how willing westerners are to buy into China bad news even on here.

    • Yun [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      No need to assume anything. Just withhold judgement until we have more info.

  • Torenico [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Support for our LGBT comrades in China :heart-sickle:

  • pooh [she/her, any]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Considering Chinese state media puts out stuff like this ‘Gay Leap Forward’ video, I seriously doubt they are specifically targeting LGBT individuals and groups. Also, as others have said, China has no history of deep-seated homophobia like the west has. This looks like another attempt by the media/CIA to try to build justification for future aggressive actions against China.

    • Yun [he/him]
      ·
      edit-2
      3 years ago

      This part used to be on Sina Weibo wikipedia but now they removed it I wonder why

      You can check the history for the page starting from around the date you saw it.

      In the meantime, I found this SCMP article: https://archive.is/u1ymD

  • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Yeah it's a very socially conservative country. Remember the time Nigerian people and other Africans were racially discriminated against during the beginning of Covid? China has always been bad on a lot of social issues unfortunately

      • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]
        ·
        edit-2
        3 years ago

        It's good and all but it only happened after this incident went public, and the African Union reprimanded China. Why were African immigrants forced by the Guangzhou local government into this quarantine and testing situation anyway in the first place? None of this would've happened if they treated the African immigrants the same way they treated others. Also in this year's new year's celebration there was blackface. It's very bad and there's no way to possibly justify it

    • comi [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      I thought they were slowly becoming more accepting :deeper-sadness:

      • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]
        ·
        edit-2
        3 years ago

        They are in a way but it's slow and hard work. While China has done a lot of good diplomacy in Africa recently, there's still a ton of animosity, especially in South Africa, considering China's past support of the apartheid government during the border wars.

        Also rich white failsons can still go to China to "teach English", and be idolised in a way, though that phenomenon is much less, it's still a thing. Some people made an entire YouTube career out of it. I have heard of a few people that have still done that in a way.

        • comi [he/him]
          ·
          edit-2
          3 years ago

          oh yeah, using whitey idol to pose in photos of shady universities is definitely a thing still. I'm concerned that ccp is kinda old, so it could be some weird personal conservatism which will evolve into something uglier, when they'll inevitably get some protests :sadness:

          • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]
            ·
            3 years ago

            Yeah China is not good on social issues. Even this year's new year's celebration featured blackface and a monkey costume. Though some of the younger CCP/CPC members seem to be cool, and much more supportive of LGBTQIA+ rights, hopefully they get more influence in the party soon

      • Mardoniush [she/her]
        ·
        3 years ago

        They are. I suspect this is a provincial government or a department doing this without full approval from the inner party. There was a similar case a few months back where the SCMP posted some anti LGBT cringe and the official party newspaper published a harsh rebuttal.

  • Lerios [hy/hym]
    ·
    3 years ago

    as a gay tankie, what the fuck, xi pls :sadness-abysmal:

  • 1267 [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    https://twitter.com/RealSexyCyborg/status/1412658504020623367?s=19