Amid vehement opposition to the Gay Games, cool heads must prevail
Most Hongkongers accept that some people are homosexual or bisexual, and showcasing our city’s inclusivity seems harmless enough. Yet official support has been mixed and debates have become unpleasant.
Homosexuality has been documented in China for many hundreds of years. Several early Chinese emperors are thought to have had homosexual relationships in addition to heterosexual ones. Emperor Ai of the Han dynasty, for example, is reported to have had a long-running affair with one of his male concubines.
Bian Er Chai, a collection of short stories published in the late Ming dynasty covering similar ground, is famous in Chinese literature. But all emperors had to take female partners to ensure an heir. Homosexuality for both men and women is legal in Hong Kong and on the mainland and, in the latter case, was so for most of the last century, except for a brief period between 1979 and 1997.
Therefore the suggestion, which is sometimes advanced, that homosexuality is somehow un-Chinese and a recent import from the decadent West, is simply absurd and does not correspond to historical fact.