Searching for an online space for feminism? The Chinese feminist group Gender Watch Women’s Voice and its changing approaches to online misogyny

Abstract

Based on a case study of a leading Chinese feminist group, the Gender Watch Women’s Voice (GWWV), this paper examines the ways in which this feminist group has perceived misogyny and used its social media platforms to respond in the Chinese context. Drawing on a two-phase ethnographic study of the GWWV’s online communities, this study specifically reveals the GWWV’s changing attitudes towards the hostile messages they often confront online. It also aims to identify the innovative strategies that have been deployed by the GWWV to address the Chinese backlash against feminism. This paper argues that, in the Chinese context, what digital feminist activism has brought about is not social change but the increasing problem of misogyny online.

Keywords:

• China
• misogyny
• backlash against feminism
• social media
• feminist groups

Notes

1. Sina Weibo (weibo means microblog in Chinese), a copycat of Twitter, was launched in 2009. Today, it is the most popular microblog platform in China, with 376 million active monthly users by September of 2017 (Weibo Data Centre 2017).

2. WeChat, known as a cross between WhatsApp and Facebook, is a ubiquitous mobile messaging, social media, and payments platform in China. It was first released by the Tencent Incorporation in 2011. By 2015, WeChat had bypassed Sina Weibo and become the dominant social media platform in China (Kantar China Insights 2016). According to the latest Tencent statistics (Tencent, 2017), WeChat had 938 million active monthly users by March 2017, both within and outside of China.

3. This is due, in many ways, to the fact that, in the eyes of the Chinese government, the Western term “feminism” indicates social or political change, which can pose potential threats to China’s political stability. In addition, many Chinese women grew up under the shadow of the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976), which resulted in their resistance to any ideas related to turmoil, activism, and protest. Thus, they normally refuse to use the word “feminism,” as, when translated into Chinese, it is reminiscent of fierce political movement.

4. The ACWF, founded in 1949, is the largest officially recognized organization representing women’s interests across all ethnic groups in China. It plays the role of Chinese women’s representative in order to contribute to national development and to participate in political decision-making. It also acts as a mouthpiece for the CCP to promote development for all Chinese women and to protect the rights of all Chinese women. Another striking feature of the ACWF is its well-established, large-scale organizational structure. Apart from its hierarchal internal structure, the ACWF has a network that runs from the highest national level down to 31 provincial-level branches, then down to numerous branches at the municipal, county, and village levels in China. In addition, it sponsors and supervises 14 s-tier associations, as well as 17 group members that all are national women’s organizations registered with the Ministry of Civil Affairs.

5. The GWWV’s current coordinator, Man Man, refused my proposal to interview the group’s two additional full-time staff members and one volunteer, claiming that she was the sole spokesperson of the group.