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“One Step Forward for Germany, One Step Back for China” – Weibo Discussions on Homosexuality
On June 30, two important moments happened for gay emancipation – one is called “a step forward”, the other “a step backward.”
On the same day that same-sex marriage was legalized in Germany, Chinese regulators issued new criteria for online programs that classify homosexuality as an “abnormal sexual relationship.”
According to the new regulations that were released on Friday, online videos in mainland China can no longer portray “abnormal sexual relations,” listing homosexuality together with incest and sexual abuse.
“It won’t be long before our voice will be gone from Weibo. If we disappear, we hope you won’t give up.”
The new criteria drew a lot of criticism on social media. Many Chinese LGBT groups, including Comrade’s Voice (@同志之声: ‘comrade’- tóngzhì – is a common way to refer to gays), denounced how Chinese regulators represented homosexuality. Comrade’s Voice even made a public plea, asking the regulators to correct their “errors,” as they are “harmful to China’s LGBT community.”
Their Weibo post received over 23330 comments and 90000 shares within 24 hours. The post has since been locked for further comments.
LGBT group “Comrade’s Voice” denounced the new rules on Weibo.
On July 1st, Comrade’s Voice wrote that their options for posting and commenting on Weibo had become limited, and that there were indications their account, which has over 160670 followers, might soon be closed by online regulators.
“We want to thank everyone for making Comrade’s Voice such a powerful voice since it came into being in 2009. Our [recent] post received over 80.000 shares (..), we thank you for your courageous voices. The post has now been disabled for commenting and sharing. As we’ve seen with others, it won’t be long before our voice will be gone from Weibo. If we disappear, we hope you will not give up on any opportunity to let your voices be heard. Equal rights don’t come dropping from the sky. Please be kind-hearted and loving, please stay positive about the future. Our work won’t stop (..). Our existence is in your hands.”
Many commenters showed their support. One woman wrote: “As a mother, I won’t stop fighting – my child has the right to choose whoever she wants to love when she grows up.”
“I love men! I am guilty! I am at fault! I am inhumane!”
As news of the new criteria went viral on Chinese social media, news of the legalization of gay marriage in Germany also made headlines – only adding more fuel to the fire.
“I just don’t know how to respond to this,” one female netizen wrote: “I see both of these news items together in the list of trending topics,.. one about Germany’s gay marriage legalization, and the other about Chinese censorship of displays of homosexuality,..”
Caijing about the German legalization of same-sex marriage on Weibo – soon attracting thousands of comments.
“The opposite of this progress is what is happening in China,” one person responded with a broken heart emoticon.
Others also pointed out that while Germany is going a step forward, China is going a step backwards (“一个在进步 一个在倒退”), especially now that online censorship has been sharpened. One person wrote:
“Why don’t we just go back to dynastic rule?1 (..) Love for the country and love for the Party is not the same thing. I love China dearly. But now I can’t do anything but helplessly look how she is being pestered. The 404 error pages just keep coming. The Hou Liang Ping case2, the Chinese table tennis team3, the Shanghai Nanjing West street incident4, etc etc. Is 2017 the year that things are going downhill? It is not that we do not love our country, but our country does not love us.”
Another male netizen wrote:
“I love men! I am guilty! I am at fault! I am inhumane! I will wear the dunce cap (高帽子) and the horizontal banner, so that all the people can criticize and humiliate me!”5
In large numbers, Weibo netizens applauded Germany’s new law and expressed their support for China’s gay community. “I am not gay, but I am rooting for you,” many said.
“Thank you all for raising your voices for the gay community. I know that the majority of people are heterosexual, but the fact that you are supportive gives us great courage,” one 21-year-old netizen wrote.
“In reality, there are still many people in society who cannot accept gays.”
“In Taiwan, gay marriage is legalized. In Germany , gay marriage is legalized. In China, homosexuality is ‘abonormal sexual behavior’,” some commenters wrote.
Many jokingly said that China might as well go back to the times when men wore a braided queue and women had their feet bound.
Although the vast majority of people on Weibo speak out in support of the LGBT community, there are also people who point out that these supportive voices on social media do not necessarily reflect the reality. He writes: “Online, you see how the majority of people here feel about homosexuality, but in reality, there are still many people in society who cannot accept gays. As for me, I would already be very happy if my family could accept my sexual orientation.”
But today, rainbow flags are ubiquitous on Weibo and anti-gay comments are difficult to find. Virtually all commenters seem to agree that defining homosexuality as an “abnormality” along with incest and perversity, on the same day that Germany becomes the 23rd country to legalise gay maririage, is a step back for China.
One Weibo blogger by the name of TangTang posted on July 1st:
“I oppose the new online regulations.
1. Please tell me what freedom of speech is, because is this what it’s supposed to be?
2. I am not homosexual, but I will defend to the death the rights of gay people.
3. I will wait and see when this post gets deleted.”
By Manya Koetse
Follow @whatsonweibo
1*”现在的中国 要不把辫子留起来吧” Freely translated. Commenter literally says “how about we bring back the braids,” referring to the common hairstyle of the Qing dynasty. The braided queue was also a sign of repression.
2 This is about allegations of sexual abuse at Beijing Film Academy: https://www.hongkongfp.com/2017/06/13/social-media-users-fight-back-weibo-censors-allegations-sexual-abuse-beijing-film-academy/
3 About the turmoil in the national table tennis team: https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2017/06/minitrue-quiet-top-players-ping-pong-protest/
4 East Nanjing Road protest over housing crackdown: http://shanghaiist.com/2017/06/12/shanghai-property-protest.php
5Practice during Cultural Revolution: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-19807561
©2017 Whatsonweibo. All rights reserved. Do not reproduce our content without permission – you can contact us at info@whatsonweibo.com.
Chapter Dive
Red Carpet, Pandas, and Power: How China Read the Trump-Xi Summit
On Chinese social media, Washington’s red-carpet reception wasn’t just diplomacy but read as recognition of China’s restored status on the global stage.
Originally published in the Eye on Digital China newsletter on Sunday, September 27, 2026. Want to receive the next edition in your inbox? Become a paid subscriber here.
The past week was all about the Trump-Xi meeting in Washington. On mainstream Chinese social media feeds, much of the focus wasn’t on what was discussed, who gained what, or what was promised. It was about: How was China welcomed? How far did they go? How exceptional was the reception? And what does this say about China’s status as a major power on the world stage today?
Symbolic moments mattered more than strategic talks. Within that framework, President Trump, along with First Lady Melania Trump, hit the right notes.
The US visit by Xi Jinping and First Lady Peng Liyuan began on Wednesday (Sep 23), with Donald Trump and the First Lady personally welcoming them at Joint Base Andrews, a highly unusual move. Presidents typically receive foreign leaders at the White House; in recent decades, airport welcomes at Andrews have been reserved almost exclusively for popes. The last comparable presidential welcome was Kennedy’s 1962 greeting of British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, a particularly close US ally at the time.
Wednesday’s welcome came with a red carpet, which members of the US military meticulously inspected and cleaned on their hands and knees right before Xi and Peng’s arrival. A photo of that scene was widely shared on Chinese social media, where many netizens seemed both bemused and struck by the sight of Americans quite literally bending over backward for their Chinese guests, with one popular Weibo account (@提刀探花在缅北) writing: “This is a scene that we will remember for decades.”
Red-carpet preparation at Joint Base Andrews
At the White House welcome ceremony on Thursday (Sep 24), where both leaders delivered remarks, Trump touched on the history of war and mentioned the American volunteer fighter group in China — the Flying Tigers — saying:
🗣️ “If we focus on our common interest, I’m confident there is much we can achieve. Throughout history, the pursuit of those common interests has connected our people across the vast oceans, across big, tremendous distances and many differences, and even made us allies in World War II. Look at the greatness we had together fighting in World War II.”
After the Washington summit concluded, Trump posted on Truth Social, calling the meeting one of “Friendship, Strength, and Success, for both China and the U.S.A.,” and adding that he looked forward to the next US-China meeting in November.
Historical Memory at the White House
But why did the special treatment given to the Chinese delegation in the US seem to matter so much in China, especially considering the ubiquitous anti-American sentiment of recent years? Not only did official media highlight it, but it also resonated strongly with netizens and became the defining story about this meeting on social media.
It goes much deeper than flattery.
Narratives of “never…
Chapter Dive
Keeping Score of History: The Mukden Incident and China’s Basketball Defeat to Japan
China’s defeat against Japan at the Asian Games trended on the same day as the commemoration of the Mukden Incident—not as a separate event, but as a painful reminder of the humiliation of war.
Football can be a useful way to gauge the state of nations.1 So can basketball, apparently.
One of the most discussed topics on Chinese social media on September 18 was the China vs. Japan men’s basketball semifinal at the Asian Games, a topic that was collectively viewed not merely through a sports angle, but through the lens of history and WWII – especially on an important commemoration day that was all about China’s war against Japanese aggression.
September 18 marks the anniversary of the Mukden Incident in 1931. Right next to the basketball game, that topic became one of the top keywords on Weibo and other Chinese platforms on Friday.2
The Mukden Incident —a staged explosion that damaged a section of Japanese railway in Shenyang [Mukden] on September 18, 1931—was used as a pretext for Japan’s invasion of Manchuria and has come to be widely regarded by Chinese historians and officials as the true starting point of the Second Sino-Japanese War.
On this significant day, the China vs. Japan game in Nagoya ended in a major 77-97 loss for the Chinese team, which critics attributed to a lack of speed and tactical weaknesses that left them defenseless against the Japanese team’s swift attacks. Making it worse, the Chinese had the advantage of taller players, and the Japanese weren’t even playing with their best team.
“Like a top-grade horse losing to a bottom-grade horse,” one sports columnist wrote (“是我们的上等马输给了对方的下等马”).
Prior to the game, many commenters already questioned why a China-Japan face-off should take place on such a sensitive date, while others suggested that the Chinese team “could not afford to lose on this day.”
Posted by Weibo user 君见理5, this AI poster transforms…
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Red Carpet, Pandas, and Power: How China Read the Trump-Xi Summit
Keeping Score of History: The Mukden Incident and China’s Basketball Defeat to Japan
The Rise of “Shuaqi-ism,” Taking Starbucks to the Fields, and Pretending to Go to Work
Why Japan Has So Many Surnames, China’s Back-to-School Shifts & Taiwan Pavilion Trouble
Blame Games & Bad Signs: Nepal–Tibet Floods, Huawei’s Toilet Trouble, “Screwed” Graduates
China’s CITIC Tower Crash: The Story That Never Trended
“Even Pigs Have AC”: The European Heatwave Through Chinese Eyes
“God Won’t Save Us, but the PLA Will”: Floods, Faith, and Kung Fu Soccer Nostalgia
How Chinese AI Videos Turned Foreigners into Villains
The Power of Ugly: Why Niu Lai Became China’s Unlikeliest Box-Office Hit
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Amy Yu
March 16, 2018 at 6:57 am
I find the grip of censorship and influence that Chinese Communist Party can have over the media of our country to be quite shocking, and this is evidence that we have not come as far as we have thought for our freedom and rights of expression. Just as propaganda has served this party for centuries in maintain a strong grip on power in our country, this form of censorship is undermining intellect and freedom of the people of China by limiting one of the truest forms of expression in the 21st century – social media. This should be a place for people to be themselves and express what they believe in, not opportunity for powers in our country to show control over us. It is ironic that this occur on same day that Germany joined 22 other countries in legalising gay marriage and if you ask me, this is strong evidence that China is not only moving backwards, but is afraid of moving forwards. To try and stop LGBTQ movement in China, they have used the tool that has manipulated people of this country for such a long time – censorship.
To me, this whole incident makes one thing clear. Sure, there is more information and expression available for Chinese people through social media than there had been before. On the surface, this seems like large leap forward for our people and freedom of choice and expression that we hold. However, when we look deeper, it become clear that this information and the freedom that people think they have for exploring it simply makes it easier to sensor and guide what people know. More information does not always mean we receive fair account of information or even detailed account of events of happenings in the world. It simply makes it easier for government and powers of censorship to have big influence and manipulation on what we know and also they can manage the information that we receive.
I see this as sad time for Chinese media because this incident show that we do not have any control of our media and anything can be taken away from us in an instant. Evidence of this is not just in banning of homosexual images and videos, but also in locking and closing of accounts that argue against this act. For all work that has happened to allow freedom of expression in China since at least 1980s, this incident is very sad reminder for us that freedom of expression and choice we hold is only useful if government allows it.