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Sinica Podcast

Why China needs a #MeToo campaign but won’t allow it: A conversation with Leta Hong Fincher

Sinica Podcast

Kaiser Kuo

Culture, China News, Hangzhou, Chinese, International Relations, Chongqing, Beijing, Sichuan, Currentaffairs, China, Politics, Chengdu, Shanghai, Guangzhou, China Economy, News, China Politics, Business, Film, Shenzhen

4.8676 Ratings

🗓️ 30 November 2017

⏱️ 62 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Leta Hong Fincher is the author of the book Leftover Women: The Resurgence of Gender Inequality in China and the upcoming book Betraying Big Brother: The Rise of China's Feminist Resistance, and a regular commentator on the state of feminism and gender discrimination in China today. She joins Jeremy and Kaiser to discuss sexism and sexual harassment in China and why, she says, the government is complicit. Explosive cases of sexual harassment and abuse have grabbed headlines for months in the U.S., as countless men in media, entertainment, and politics have been accused of gross sexual misbehavior. Most of the accused who are not politicians have faced serious consequences, as a majority of America rallies around the #MeToo campaign, raising awareness of the severity of the problem. In China, Leta says, the situation is entirely different. Sexist behavior is rampant in Chinese workplaces, but the government is intolerant of social media campaigns like #MeToo. Feminism is treated as a sensitive subject by censors and by the state-controlled press, which is unwilling to publish allegations that could be socially destabilizing. And though some women have broken through in business despite extraordinary sexism, representation by women at the top of China’s government is not even token.   Recommendations: Jeremy: A Japanese Mirror: Heroes and Villains of Japanese Culture, by Ian Buruma. Leta: The blog Women and Gender in China, and the twitter account @halfthesky49, run by University of Nottingham scholar Séagh Kehoe. Kaiser: The China Channel from the L.A. Review of Books. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Transcript

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0:00.0

Welcome to the Cynical Podcast, a weekly discussion of current affairs in China, produced in partnership with SubChina.

0:15.0

SubChina is the best way to stay on top of the most important news from China in just a few minutes a day with our daily email

0:21.9

newsletter, our handy smartphone app, and of course at the newly redesigned website,

0:27.2

SUPChina.com.

0:28.4

Definitely go check it out.

0:29.5

We are happy with the redesign, but want your feedback on the site.

0:33.4

I'm Kaiser Guo and I am coming to you today from Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

0:36.9

I am joined from

0:37.7

Nashville, Tennessee by Jeremy Goldcorn, editor-in-chief of Sub-China. Good morning there, Jeremy. Please greet

0:43.1

the listeners, won't you? Good morning, Kaiser. Good morning listeners. And I have to tell you what's going

0:48.5

on in my holler in Tennessee. We've been invaded by swarms of ladybugs, which was something I never knew existed when I was a kid in South Africa.

0:57.6

We used to only get like one, maybe two together.

1:01.0

And they were so cute.

1:02.0

They were good for you.

1:02.3

Yeah, they were good luck.

1:03.5

Well, not that there's swarms of them at the end of the fall.

1:06.3

They seem to just commit sort of kamikaze themselves into our windows.

1:15.0

It's quite strange.

1:16.4

Anyway, something new in America every day for me.

1:20.6

They eat aphids.

1:22.0

They're good for the garden.

1:23.8

Anyway, there is always a certain hubris whenever someone claims to be living in an historic moment.

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