Mar. 2021; I am who I am

Being foreign and tall here in Shenzhen, a place of mostly migrants, I attract a lot of stares, finger pointing and giggles on a daily basis. Sometimes it bothers me, most of the time I just ignore it. But at least several times a week someone will speak to me, and as I’ve mentioned before, I think that if you are a guest in another country then you should act as an ambassador from your own place of birth, and be civil, polite and courteous at all times. Even thought I’m actually quite a timid person by nature, I try to pluck up the courage to not shy away from conversation with people. Most of the time these encounters are really quite brief, just usually someone who is curious about others and wants to find out more. It usually starts with “wow you’re so tall. How tall are you?” I tell them I’m 196, and usually jokingly say “and you? How tall are you? 190?” (usually causes a chuckle and a loud “bu shi!!”) And nearly always next comes the invariable “where are you from?” Now I must have been asked this literally hundreds upon hundreds of times in the last decade, possibly thousands. Some people skip the question and inform me that “aah you are American.” To which I sometimes rather cheekily reply “aaah, you are Japanese.” This never fails to evoke a reaction, most times just a good laugh, but sometimes I feel very happy that people don’t carry guns here.

*Side note; I have never been to a place that is so utterly fixated on someone's height. From job adverts to general conversation, people sometimes seem a little obsessed about peoples vertical centimetres. I’ve been asked many times “how did you get so tall?” like it’s a choice thing. If it’s a parent or young person I’ll say “by not eating meat. Animals that eat meat don’t grow tall, like cats and dogs. Animals that don’t eat meat grow very tall,” which immediately conjures images of giraffes in the head of the naive. I’m not sure I’ve ever created a vegetarian with such words, but I do continue to try.

Now being British has a lot of things/stuff attached to it. Let’s go over a few of these; Manchester United; No, real Brits support Man City. Manchester United is for people who don’t know about football (and no it’s not called bloody soccer, it’s called football. Get it right.) 

Fish and chips; We yes it may be something we are known for, but it’s not like the only food we live on. That would be like saying Chinese people only eat Peking duck. British food may be a little bland compared to Thai, Mexican, Indian, Chinese cuisine etc, but it’s not all that bad.

Colonialisation; Yes that’s a bit of a thing. We were once a very powerful empire, building our glory on the sweat and tears of other countries’ people we chose to enslave, exploit, lie to and cheat to get what we wanted. And it generally worked. But now the UK is a tiny little mouse compared to it’s former power and influence on the world. What goes around comes around. But, the one thing I’m occasionally asked about is the general topic of this weeks Sunday scribble. The notion that a few dozen inquisitive people here have openly pondered, and I think it’s time to lay a few cards on the table and offer an opinion on such matters. “Aaah, British. Gay.”

There’s several things about my country of birth I’m truly not proud of. We’ve had unpleasant waves of racism. The black people immigrating from Africa and the Caribbean in the 1950’s. The Indians and Pakistani people in the 70’s. The Polish and eastern Europeans in the late 90’s and onwards. But generally I’ll still say that the UK is a very accepting place overall, and tens of thousands of people choose to emigrate there to start new lives every year. In our history we did a whole lot of bad stuff to other countries, invading and taking their land, murdering the natives and claiming that it now belongs to us. In fact, we “colonised” 56 countries in total, that’s about a quarter of all the countries in the world, and at some point in history we have invaded over 90% of all the countries in the world. Naughty naughty. But along with all the bad stuff there’s some good stuff too. One thing I’m really quite proud of is our warm relationship with gay people. As long as history can record we’ve had gay kings and queens and politicians, leaders and artists, business moguls, celebrities and movie stars, singers and more, across all walks of life. We’ve had openly gay TV hosts and programs for decades. Every city has gay clubs and bars (and I’ve been to loads, they are exceptionally good fun.) We just love gay people. But now, being an adopted Zhonguo-ren of over a decade, I can absolutely see some stark differences here compared to where I’m from…

One thing I found truly shocking was that homosexuality wasn’t officially decriminalized until 1997 in China. Therefore meaning that before that, your sexuality made you a criminal. In fact, as prehistorically minded as it may be, it’s still actually illegal to be homosexual in 71 of the worlds countries (including Singapore, Malaysia, and some parts of Indonesia.) Now I’m tall. And I’m white. It’s nothing I had control over, it had zero to do with my parenting or family status or intellect or anything else, it just is. And that’s exactly the same for homosexuality. It’s not a choice. People don’t choose to be gay or straight, they just want to be happy. Men don’t wake up one day and think “ooh I’ve had enough of touching boobs, today I’m going to put on a dress and stick a carrot up my ass.” No no no. If being gay is a choice, then when did you decide to become straight? Look in the mirror at your eye colour. Look at the size of your feet. Was that your choice? Did you have any influence on those? No. So how would it be, for example, if a country decided that having brown eyes was illegal. We would all think it so ridiculously idiotic that the people would refuse to accept it. But 71 countries don’t think that. As unthinkable as it may sound, being gay in China was actually considered (and still is, by some) to be a mental illness. Now schizophrenia is a mental disorder. Taking pleasure from watching animals or people in pain is a mental disorder. Being attracted to somebody of your own sex is not.

*Side note; Only a few months ago a court in Jiangsu province ruled in favour of a publisher that described homosexuality as a “psychological disorder” in a university textbook. Yes, a university textbook, for people to learn and study from. And it wasn’t until 2001 that homosexuality was de-categorised as a mental disorder by the Chinese Psychiatric Association. Oh dear.

I recall being asked only last year, by a delightful young lady who clearly hadn’t seen too much of the world, “why are there so many gay men in England.” Now I’m not sure where she got this idea from, but I thought it wise to open a conversation about this, and see what was making her tick. I asked her which country did she think had the most gay people. She replied with “England. And America.” Her opinion had obviously been formed by movies and TV shows, and so I went on to explain that being gay isn’t a life choice, it’s just how you are. And so if it’s just how people are born, then you might dare to say it can roughly come down to a percentage. If we were to say, for example, that 2% of the world is homosexual. So 2% of the UK (66 million) would mean around 1.3 million people are gay. The US (330 million) would mean around 6.6 million. And China? That would equate to around 28 million gay people. Now this is just a flippant and crude off-the-cuff example I used, but it absolutely blew her mind. Her immediate reaction was of denial and anger. “No! No way. No.” Now I don’t believe any one country in the world has more or less straight or gay people than others, but for sure some places are much more tolerant towards peoples lifestyles, and therefore some people are afforded the luxury of being open about who they are. Seeing two men kissing or holding hands in London wouldn’t make anybody bat an eyelid, but doing that in other, less understanding countries, might get you in very hot water.

One thing I’m extremely happy to see here, is that attitudes really are changing. Over the past several years I see more and more people standing up for their rights and their freedoms, and their choice of partner is thankfully very much a part of that. Only last weekend I did photos for a drag queen and king show at a very nice bar in Futians CBD area. There were dozens upon dozens of same sex couples there, both Chinese and non Chinese, outwardly expressing their love and affection for one other, and showing no fear of discrimination or bias, and attracting no disapproving stares or damning comments from others. I found this a bit of a milestone in my time here. It made me feel so good that the times they are a’ changing, and changing for the better. But, when it comes to our authorities, they might still have something to say on the matter…

I recently read a report on how the powers that be had decided that the country needed to take a good look at its men, and somehow dream up ways to add a little more masculinity to them. We all know how popular effeminate young men are in pop culture nowadays here. Perfect white skin, make up and lipstick, wearing soft pastel colours and speaking their sweet, gentle voices. But some of our leaders are a bit concerned about this, and have decided to hopefully make them “man up” a little. But how, you may ask? Well the general idea was to make them be more interested in “manly” stuff, with the main direction aiming towards sports and gyms. Oh. My. Word. Let’s think about this for a second. A man, probably an old man, a man with significant power and respect amongst his peers and above us mere peasants, has somehow decided that going to the gym will make men “less feminine and more masculine.” First of all, does anyone have any idea of just how many gay men frequently go to the gym?! IT’S A LOT!! And does anyone in their right mind think that an environment full of sweaty, tight muscular torsos, panting with exhaustion, wearing tiny skin tight clothing and staring at each others bodies is an entirely heterosexual experience??? It’s nothing less than laughable that a man (or men) of such power can dream this rubbish up. Instead of worrying so much about the population problem (and bird-brainstorming ways to increase the numbers of marriages, and therefore births, terrified that gay men can’t make babies) perhaps they should consider the fact that China currently has over 30 million more males than females, and that this number is only increasing, and with the still-ongoing traditional preference for sons rather than daughters that perhaps they should consider ways of educating people that both sexes are equal, and needed for a balanced society? That’s 30 million men that will never get married and reproduce, but still have sexual needs. At least the economy will boost with sales of Kleenex and rubber dolls.

*Side note; Another thing that caught my, and many others attention, is the censoring of such trivial matters as same sex relationships. I watched and noticed that both the Queen movie (Bohemian Rhapsody) and the Elton John movie (Rocket man) had uncut scenes and mentionings of hard drug use and addictions, but the notion of a man finding happiness with another man was left on the cutting room floor. Oh dear. Someone please wake up the censors, it’s 2021. They seem to have been asleep for a few decades. This is a severe social problem where we can turn on the TV and watch endless scenes of violence and guns blazing, but we can’t see a woman be in love with another woman. What do we want to teach our children to consider “normal?” Violence? or love? As the late, great Ernest Gaines put it, “why is it that, as a culture, we are more comfortable seeing two men holding guns than holding hands?”

There are many contradictions about life in China that can be charming, and many that can be infuriating. Upon trips to places like Thailand the the Philippines, homosexuality is considered as normal as tea and toast. And it is “normal,” whatever that means. Choosing to be with another man or woman is in no way abnormal. We love who we love, and we have very little control over what our hearts desire. We live in one of the most modern societies in the world, and yet some attitudes truly belong with the dinosaurs. Some even offer the reasoning of “it’s not natural.” How pathetically minded to think that just because two men or two women cannot produce a baby (without scientific help) that it’s not “natural.” Let me tell you something. Giving in to an arranged marriage in your twenties, to a person you barely know, and then reproducing with someone you don’t love, going through life putting your own needs and wants and desires last, then being left alone in old age feeling unfulfilled and regretful, just to keep your parents happy. Now that’s not natural. Homosexuality is found in over 450 species of life on this planet. Homophobia is found in only 1. Which one seems unnatural now?

As you can clearly tell, I’m all for equality, whether that be male, female, gay or straight or any other form. People should have the right to be happy, whoever that may be with. Gay marriages are becoming more and more recognized around the world, it’s only a matter of time before only the most backward thinking of nations will still be opposed. Let’s hope China is not one of them. Marriage is a human right, not a heterosexual privilege. And hey, if you are against gay marriages then blame straight people, they’re the ones who keep having gay babies. All parents should be aware that when they curse or ridicule gay people, they may be cursing or ridiculing their own child. To some people there is an archaic notion that if your child is gay, that you have somehow failed as a parent. I wish that before people decided to reproduce there was some kind of intelligence test. Some people really shouldn’t have children, for the sake of the rest of the world. I’ll wrap up this weeks Sunday Scribble with something I read recently , but with no author accredited. I think it sums it up pretty well.

“Love isn’t perfect. It isn’t a fairytale or a storybook and it doesn’t always come easy. Love is overcoming obstacles, facing challenges, fighting to be together, holding on and never letting go. It is a short word, easy to spell, difficult to define, and impossible to live without. Love is work, but most of all, love is realizing that every hour, every minute, every second of it, was worth it because you did it together.”

Whoever you are with.